MICROCOSM MACROCOSM ANALOGY IN RASĀ ʾ IL IKHWĀ N AṢ Ṣ AFĀ ʾ AND CERTAIN RELATED TEXTS

Microcosm-Macrocosm Analogy in
Rasa ’il Ikhwan as-Safa ’ and Certain Related Texts

INKA NOKSO-KOIVISTO

Academic dissertation to be publicly discussed, by due permission of the Faculty
of Aits at the University of Helsinki in auditorium XIV,
on the 24th of October, 2014 at 12 o’clock.

University of Helsinki, Department of World Cultures

Helsinki 2014

Inka Nokso-Koivisto

Microcosm-Macrocosm Analog}’ in the Rasa 'il Ikhwan as-Safa ’ and Certain Related Texts
Copyright © Inka Nokso-Koivisto 2014

ISBN 978-951-51-0239-3

Unigrafia

Helsinki 2014

To Oskari

ABSTRACT

The microcosm-macrocosm analogy - the idea of man as a miniature of the sur¬
rounding reality or part of it - is a prevailing theme in Rasa 'il Ikhwan as-Safd'.
This study examines the analogy primarily in this encyclopaedia completed during
the tenth century and compares the views presented in it to those in certain other
texts from the ninth to the thirteenth centuries: Sirr al-khalTqa, some texts at¬
tributed to Jabir ibn Hayyan, some Sufi writings of al-Ghazall (d. 1111),
SuhrawardI (d. 1191) and Ibn 'ArabI (d. 1240), and al-QazwInl’s (d. 1283) ' Ajd'ib
al-makhluqat. The aim is to explore the influence of microcosmism on the idea of
man in these texts and to define the position of the Rasa 'il in the development of
the topic in mediaeval Islamic thought.

Rudolf Allers’s classification of microcosmism is used as the main conceptual
framework in this analysis. All Allers’s six varieties of the analogy receive vari¬
ous interpretations in the Islamic tradition. In the Islamic context, microcosmism
can be seen as following the Greek philosophical tradition adding earlier mytho¬
logical elements to it and, at times, explaining it through Islamic religious con¬
cepts.

This study proposes a threefold approach to the examination of microcos¬
mism. Firstly, the analogy appears as a human-specific feature defining the cos¬
mological position of the human species. In this form, microcosmism is used in all
of the studied texts and often the role of the human being as an intermediate being
in the universe is in focus. Secondly, attitudes towards the corporeal aspect of
man are approached through the use of the analogy. In this form, the idea is close¬
ly related to the scientific worldview and sometimes the meaning given to the
analogy can only be understood within the frames of a scientific theory. Thirdly,
the normative aspect is included in the analogy and it is used in descriptions of
human perfection. This variation occurs mostly in the epistemological contexts
and in the examination of ethical ideals. Especially Sufi thinkers elaborate this
form of the analogy and it is also in the key position of microcosmism in the
Rasa 'il.

Microcosmism in the Rasa 'il is a synthesis of various forms of the analogy
developed earlier in the Islamic tradition and it anticipates many ideas that only
become central in the later texts. Obvious thematic similarities between the texts
can be found, but transmission of particular elements of microcosmism is possible
to trace in only a few cases. For instance, some comparisons of the Rasa 'il be¬
tween the human body and the surrounding reality seem to be transmitted - direct¬
ly or indirectly - even to the latest texts of the corpus.

5

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I express my gratitude to all those people who have made this study possible. The
foremost person in my academic carrier until now has been my supervisor Profes¬
sor Jaakko Hameen-Anttila, whose patient attention and advice from my very first
years as a student in Arabic and Islamic studies until the final corrections of this
manuscript have been indispensable. I am much obliged to him for all this. I also
wish to express my sincere gratitude to Professor Taneli Kukkonen for his ideas
and observations and to Professor Carmela Baffioni for reading and commenting
on the manuscript in its early stage. I am gratefi.il to my assessors Professor Gode-
froid de Callatay and Professor Daniel De Smet for then valuable suggestions and
corrections. I also want to thank Dr. Mark Shackleton, who kindly made the lan¬
guage more readable.

Financially this study has been made possible by the Academy of Finland pro¬
ject the Intellectual Heritage of the Ancient Near East at the University of Helsin¬
ki and by the European Research Council’s project Subjectivity and Selfhood in
the Arabic and Latin Traditions at the University of Jyvaskyla. During the pro¬
cess, I have also worked as an assistant in Arabic and Islamic studies at the Uni¬
versity of Helsinki and received grants from the Research Foundation of the Uni¬
versity of Helsinki and the Foundation of the Finnish Institute in the Middle East.
I would also like to express my gratitude to the University of Naples L’Orientale,
the Institut fiir Geschichte der Arabisch-Islamischen Wissenschaften and the Finn¬
ish Institute in Damascus for receving me as a visiting researcher during my PhD-
studies.

The relaxed and warm atmosphere of the former Institute of Asian and Afri¬
can Studies has been an essential inspiration for me. I would like to thank all my
colleagues and teachers at the Institute for academic and non-academic conversa¬
tions, and their company and collaboration in the past years, especially, Sylvia
Akar, Raisa Asikainen, Lotta Aunio, Patricia Berg, Axel Fleisch, Jouni Har-
jumaki, Tiina Hyytiainen, Sanae Ito, Hannu Juusola, Miia Koivu, Ilkka Lindstedt,
Janne Mattila, Raija Mattila, Simo Muir, Teemu Naarajarvi, Marianna Ruutala,
Minna Saarnivaara, Jonas Sivela, Saana Svard, Riikka Tuori, Mikko Viitamaki
and Kaj Ohrnberg. In addition, I wish to thank the SSALT project members and
everybody attending the seminars in Helsinki and Jyvaskyla.

In my personal life I express my gratitude to all my beloved ones. I am deeply
grateful to my family, Matti, Raija, Pertti, Eeva, Riina, Sakari and Sampsa, and to
my whole family-in-law. In addition to them, I am much indebted to all my dear
friends, especially to Elli, Eve, Krisse, Sohvi and Tiku. As I write this, it has been
a year since we were blessed with a most beautiful son Totti, who has brought to

6

our life great happiness. I cannot express enough gratitude for that. I dedicate this
book with love to my husband Oskari, whose constant encouragement and believe
in me and my work has made this project possible.

7

CONTENTS

Abstract.5

Acknowledgments.6

Contents.8

Note on Translations.11

1. Introduction.13

1.1 Definition of Microcosmism.14

1.2 Historical Background of the Microcosmic Idea.14

1.2.1 Mythological Roots ofthe Analogy. 15

1.2.2 Microcosm as a Philosophical Concept. 18

1.2.3 Judeo-Christian Tradition and Microcosmism.23

1.3 Previous Classifications.26

1.3.1 Metaphysical and Metaphorical Microcosmisms.28

1.3.2 Cosmological Approaches.30

1.3.3 Sociological Parallelism.31

1.3.4 Microcosmic Theories and Knowledge.32

1.4 Microcosmism in this Study.33

1.4.1 Previous Studies of the Islamic Microcosmic Idea.34

1.4.2 Broad Definition.35

1.4.3 Three Perspectives on Microcosmism.37

1.4.3.1 Human-Specific Microcosmism.38

1.4.3.2 Physiological Microcosmism.39

1.4.3.3 Nonnative Microcosmism.40

2. The Corpus.43

2.1 On terminology: “Islamic Thought”.43

2.2 RasA’il IkhwAn as-SafA’.45

2.2.1 Dating of the Work.46

2.2.2 Identification of the Authors.47

2.2.3 Philosophy of the Ikhwan.49

2.2.4 The Rasa 'il and Microcosmism.50

2.3 Other Texts.55

2.3.1 Sirr al-khaliqa .56

2.3.2 The Jabirian Corpus .57

2.3.3 Sufism.60

2.3.3.1 Al-Ghazali.60

2.3.3.2 SuhrawardI.61

2.3.3.3 Ibn'ArabI.63

2.3.4 Aja 'ib al-makhluqat .64

2.3.5 Additional Texts.65

3. Thf, Microcosmic Idea and the Human Species.67

3.1 Anthropomorphic Cosmology.68

3.1.1 The Universe as an Animated Being.68

3.1.2 Emanation and the Microcosmic Idea.71

3.2 The Human Archetype as a Microcosm.74

3.2.1 Adam and the Human-Specific Explanation of the Analogy.74

3.2.2 Gabriel - the Platonic Idea of the Human Being.79

3.3 Man as the Middle Being.82

3.3.1 The Twofold Nature of Man.82

3.3.2 Between Light and Darkness.85

3.4 Man Epitomizing Species.87

3.4.1 Plants - Animals - Man.88

3.4.2 Animal Characteristic in Man.90

4. Physiological Aspect of Microcosmism.95

4.1 The Body-a Prison or a Mount?.96

4.1.1 Microcosmism and Definition of Man.96

4.1.2 The Relationship of the Body to the Soul.99

4.2 Explicit Physiological Comparisons.103

4.2.1 Comparisons and Hierarchy in the Human Body.103

4.2.1.1 Inner Organs in Comparisons.103

4.2.1.2 The Body as a Dwelling Place.106

4.2.2 Mythological Features of Comparisons.110

4.2.3 Astrology in Physiological Comparisons.116

4.3 Scientific Worldview and Physiological Microcosm.120

4.3.1 Astronomical Disciplines.120

4.3.1.1 Astrological Embryology.121

4.3.1.2 Aesthetics.125

4.3.2 Physiognomy.130

4.3.3 Alchemy.133

4.3.4 Music Therapy.136

4.3.4.1 Fours in Man.136

4.3.4.2 Practical Interpretation of the Tetrads.138

9

5. Becoming a Microcosm.143

5.1 The Spiritual in Man and the Microcosmic Idea.144

5.1.1 Unity of the Soul.144

5.1.2 Faculties of Man.147

5.1.2.1 Categories of the Faculties.147

5.1.2.2 Faculties and Explicit Comparisons.153

5.2 Faculties of the Perfect Microcosm.160

5.2.1 City-State Comparisons and the Process of Knowing.160

5.2.2 Flosts of the Fleart.162

5.2.3 A Journey through the Human Kingdom.165

5.3 Theory of Knowledge and Microcosm.169

5.3.1 Self-Knowledge.171

5.3.1.1 Knowledge of the Self, Knowledge of the Soul.171

5.3.1.2 The Goal of Self-Contemplation.174

5.3.1.3 The Self as a Mirror of the Divine.175

5.3.2 Knowing as Actualizing a Microcosm.178

5.3.2.1 Knowledge Making a Microcosm.178

5.3.2.2 Potential Microcosm as a Requirement for Knowledge.180

5.3.3 Microcosm and Mystical Perfection.183

5.3.3.1 Spiritual Castle(s) in the Human Soul.183

5.3.3.2 Actualization of the Microcosm as Polishing One’s Heart.184

5.4 Microcosmic Arts.187

5.4.1 Imitating the Creator.187

5.4.2 Cosmological Definition of Music.189

6. Conclusions.191

6.1 Forms of the Analogy.191

6.2 The Idea of Man and the Microcosm.193

6.2.1 The Cosmological Position of the Human Species.193

6.2.2 The Question of Corporeality.196

6.2.3 A Microcosm - Perfect Man or Anyone?.198

6.3 The RasA’il and the Development of Islamic Microcosmism.201

Sources.205

Primary Sources.205

Secondary Sources.206

10

NOTE ON TRANSLATIONS

All translations of the Qur’an, if not mentioned separately, follow A. J. Arberry’s
(1955) translation. Other translations from Arabic are mine unless indicated oth¬
erwise. When someone else’s translation is cited, the reference to the original text
is given first and the reference to the translation second. My comments and addi¬
tions to these translations are in square brackets.

11

12

1. INTRODUCTION

In this study, the Islamic 1 idea of man" will be approached from the perspective of
the microcosm-macrocosm analogy. The idea that the human being epitomizes the
surrounding reality was common in various philosophical, mythological and reli¬
gious traditions before the Islamic era. In the writings of mediaeval Islamic think¬
ers, it received a wide range of interpretations which influenced cosmological,
epistemological and overall scientific views. The authors of Rasa 'il Ikhwan as-
Safd’ laid special emphasis on the topic in their encyclopaedic work and had a
crucial position in the development of Islamic microcosmism. The microcosm-
macrocosm analogy was an essential element also in many alchemical and astro¬
logical writings and formed a part of the worldview of various Sufi authors. In a
minor role or as a mere figure of speech it can be found in most of the mediaeval
Islamic philosophical and scientific traditions.

The main purpose of this study is to provide by close reading a systematic
presentation of the meaning and use of the microcosm-macrocosm analogy in
Rasa 'il Ikhwan as-Safd I aim to define what the contexts in which man is treated
as a microcosm tell about the idea of man and how microcosmism is employed in
the description of the human being. My secondary aim is to examine the position
of the Ikhwan as-Safa’ in the development of the analogy in the Islamic tradition
by comparing their views with other relevant texts from the ninth to the thirteenth
centuries. The study pertains to the field of Islamic studies and - rather than philo¬
logical analysis of the texts - the theme will be approached from the perspective
of intellectual history.

In this chapter, I will define what has been meant by microcosmism and how
it is understood in this study. First I will provide a compact definition of the idea.
Then I will turn to the history of the analogy and give an overview of its devel¬
opment, concentrating on traditions which I consider influential in the Islamic
context. After that, the focus will be on the ways the idea has been classified by
previous scholars. These classifications will also work as the conceptual frame¬
work in this study. Lastly, I will describe the division according to which the
analogy will be approached in this study. In the fourth subsection, the specific
purposes of this study will also be presented.

Use of the terms “Islamic” and “Islamic thought” will be discussed in Chapter 2.

In this study, I will employ the personal pronoun “he” to refer to both genders. The word
"man” will also be used gender neutrally as a synonym for "human being”. Although all the
authors of the corpus and most of their audience were men, in the majority of the texts the
microcosmic idea is treated gender neutrally (even though in Arabic the “gender neutral"
personal pronoun is huwa (he) and the word insan (human being) is a masculine word).

13

1.1 DEFINITION OF MICROCOSMISM

“Microcosmic idea”, which will in this study be used synonymously with “micro¬
cosm-macrocosm analogy” and “microcosmism”, refers to the idea that features,
parts or relations appearing in a bigger entity are found summarized in some
smaller unit. Rudolf Allers defines microcosmism in the following way: “One
vague and broad conception is shared by all authors who ever speculated on the
microcosmus and its relation to the macrocosmus. The former, which the Latin
authors usually call minor mundus, has certain features or principles in common
with the macrocosmus or the universe.” (Allers 1944: 321) Hence, the basic idea
is correspondence or similarity between two entities. The way these two entities
are defined restricts the examination so that we cannot include any kind of analo¬
gies.

In its philosophical interpretations, microcosmism is usually considered to be
a correspondence between the human being and the macrocosm, and the focus is
on man as a/the microcosm. As George Perrigo Conger puts it, it is thought that
“man is a microcosm, or ‘little world,’ in one way or another epitomizing a mac¬
rocosm, or ‘great world’ - i.e. the universe or some part thereof’ (Conger 1922:
xiii). Although my approach is not purely philosophical, in this study the exami¬
nation is limited to the contexts in which the role of the microcosm is played by
man.

The next question, then, is how to define “macrocosm”. As it stands in Con¬
ger’s definition, as the counterpart of man, the macrocosm to which he is paral¬
leled does not necessarily refer to the universe as a whole - even though the term
“cosmos” indicates the entire universal order - but to any unit larger than man
which forms its own separate entity. The macrocosm can be reality in its entirety
or some smaller unit, for example, a city or a house. As will be seen, correspond¬
ences are usually found and assumed to appear at various levels simultaneously.
In this study, the entity placed in the position of the macrocosm is not restricted
and the microcosmic idea may refer to the human being as, for instance, a mi-
cropolis, a reflection of the order appearing in the heavenly spheres or a miniature
of a spiritual castle.

1.2 HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF THE MICROCOSMIC IDEA

The notion of man as a summary of the surrounding reality has been developed
for millennia in both the East and the West; traces of it can be perceived in Pre-
Socratic philosophy as well as in early mythologies. 3 Sources for Islamic micro-

Sometimes the analogy is thought to be present already in the very archaic thought of man
and animism has been regarded as a form of it. Levy (1967: 639), however, points out an

14

cosmism are manifold and can be divided into three main branches: mythological;
philosophical, referring to the Greek tradition; and Judeo-Christian thought. The
analogy developed some new forms in all these three periods and, in the Islamic
tradition, some influence from each of them can be perceived. However, as will be
seen, these three branches exchanged influence and none of them developed inde¬
pendently from each other.

1.2.1 Mythological Roots of the Analogy

The most ancient elaborations of the microcosm-macrocosm analogy pertain to
the field of mythology. It has been found to be one of the very basic concepts in
comparative religion, and, among others Mircea Eliade (1961: 37-54) recognizes
the presence of microcosmism in several mythologies and in societies that he re¬
fers to as “archaic” or “traditional”. Eliade seems to give the term “microcosm”
various meanings, one of them connected to an essential concept in his compara¬
tive mythology, axis mundi. The axis mundi is located at the centre of an inhabit¬
ed area. It is seen as the navel of the known world which summarizes the world
order, and, in this way, forms a microcosm. The axis not only brings together the
universal order, but also enables communication between different levels of reali¬
ty, for example, between heaven, earth and hell. The creation started in the axis
and the first man was created in it. Eliade finds this view universal and presents
examples of it in many traditions. Although seeking these kinds of universal fea¬
tures behind religious traditions is quite hypothetical and Eliade’s claims are open
to discussion, various examples of axis mundi that Eliade presents indicate that
microcosmism has been known in many ancient traditions.

A form of the analogy mentioned by Eliade, which has a long history as a re¬
ligious concept, is the Tree of Life. The Tree of Life has been employed as an
artistic theme in various traditions, and it has an essential mythological position in
ancient Mesopotamia. In Mesopotamian art, the Tree was thought to symbolize,
not only the world order, but also the king as the divine personification of the
world order, in other words, a portrayal of the microcosmic perfect man. Accord¬
ing to Simo Parpola (1993: 165-173), this interpretation of the tree formed a part
of the esoteric tradition accessible to the select ones alone, which in his opinion
explains the lack of textual references to it. For the chosen few who were aware of
this interpretation, the Tree included all the gods and worked as a means of

essential difference between an animistic worldview and microcosmism: “Animism and
panpsychism also regard the world as alive throughout, but the microcosm idea is distinct in
emphasizing the unity or kinship of all life and thought in the world. If man is the microcosm
of the universe, then not only is everything animated by some soul or other, but there is one
world soul by which everything is animated.”

15

achieving divine knowledge and perfecting oneself. Parpola examines this esoteric
interpretation of the Assyrian Tree of Life and attempts to prove its connections
with the later Sefirotic Tree of Life in Jewish mysticism. Parpola states that Mes¬
opotamian religious and philosophical views are “very much alive in Jewish,
Christian, and Oriental mysticism and philosophies” (Parpola 1993: 199).

Without going into the details of Parpola’s ambitious theory, it can be argued
that Mesopotamian religious ideas may have - even if not necessarily in as de¬
tailed manner as Parpola proposes - influenced later Middle-Eastern, including
Islamic, thought. Concerning the ways Mesopotamian thought was transmitted to
Islamic thinkers, Jaakko Hameen-Anttila (2001: 47-49) points out in his study on
the sources of the Islamic myths of descent and ascent, that ancient Mesopotamian
notions reached the Islamic tradition both indirectly and directly. In addition to
Greek and Judeo-Christian sources, ancient Middle-Eastern religious views had
been preserved by pagan sects, which still influenced the area of present-day Iraq
during the early Islamic era. Hence, although nothing certain can be said of mi-
crocosmic themes in particular, some Mesopotamian ideas seem to have been ab¬
sorbed into the Islamic tradition during the seventh and eighth centuries directly
from the living pagan tradition. 4

Another mythological idea connected with the microcosm-macrocosm analo¬
gy which also seems quite universal is the creation of the universe as the repro¬
duction of a living creature - a god or a primordial man. It appears already in the
Mesopotamian tradition. In the fourth tablet of Eniima Elish, a Babylonian crea¬
tion myth, Marduk divides the corpse of his conquered enemy, a feminine mon¬
strous figure Tiamat, into two. One part he uses to form the earth and the other to
create the heavens. In this way, the body of the goddess is thought to work as a
basis for the cosmos and the creation is seen as a kind of human reproduction. 5
The idea that the universe as a whole, or a part of it, is created as a reproduction of
a primordial creature’s body provides an explanation for the existing correspond¬
ence between man and the surrounding cosmos, and sometimes motivates more
extensive speculation on microcosmism. 6

I have together with Saana Svard published two articles examining the microcosm-
macrocosm analogy in the Mesopotamian tradition; see Nokso-Koivisto and Svard 2013 and
Svard and Nokso-Koivisto forthcoming 2014.

Parpola (1993: 191-192) mentions that this interpretation of the myth forms only one layer
of its meaning and there are manifold meanings given to it, some involving, for instance,
features that later appear in Neoplatonism and Pythagorean thought.

The view of creation as human reproduction takes various forms in different mythological
traditions. To mention another example, in old Scandinavian mythology, the human midgard,
was created from the body of the primordial giant Ymir. From his flesh was created the soil,
from his blood the water, from his bones the mountains, from his hair the trees and from his
skull the vault of heaven. (Davidson 1964: 27)

16

Creation as human reproduction is familiar also in the Iranian tradition. Ac¬
cording to R.C. Zaehner (2002: 198-201), especially in the materialistic branch of
Zurvanian Zoroastrianism, the microcosm-macrocosm analogy is important.
Zurvan’s body, composing the heavenly sphere, is thought to form the macrocosm
while man, the microcosm, has been created in its image. A view resembling more
closely Islamic microcosmism is found in Bundahishn, a cosmogony written dur¬
ing the ninth century and belonging to the most important remaining sources re¬
flecting Sasanian Zoroastrianism. In it, creation is presented as a sacrifice of the
cosmic man: the sky is created from his head, earth from his feet, water from his
tears, plants from his hair, the Bull from his right hand and the first man,
Gayomart, from his seed. The myth also has a sociological dimension - four clas¬
ses of men are described as being born from the body parts of the cosmic man.
(Zaehner 2002: 198-201) As Zaehner (2002: 259) remarks, Zoroastrian micro¬
cosmism could be regarded as a combination of Indian mythology and Greek
sources. Especially Zurvanian Zoroastrianism adopted Indian elements which
were in their texts expressed in terms of Greek philosophy. According to Zaehner,
although a parallel for the microcosmic idea in Zoroastrian writings can be found
in Indian sources, the term microcosm was not employed in them and the use of
the term in Pahlavi translation (gehdn T kodak) must have been absorbed from
Greek philosophers.

Iranian tradition is often considered to be an important mythological source
for Islamic microcosmism. Geo Widengren (1980) finds some obvious resem¬
blances between the idea in the Bundahishn and that in the Islamic tradition. Ex¬
amining Manichean references to the analogy, he comes to the conclusion that
Indo-Iranian influence might have reached such Islamic thinkers as the Ikhwan as-
Safa’ through Manichean sources. Although Widengren admits that the classical
texts are a possible source for some astrological elements in the Islamic micro¬
cosm-macrocosm analogy, he quite strongly traces it back to its mythological pre¬
decessors and seems to assume that the idea is mostly alien to speculative philos¬
ophy. This can be seen, for example, in his statement according to which: “The
macro-microcosmic speculations are not without difficulty integrated into the Ar¬
istotelian-Neoplatonic philosophical structure of the Brethren’s [meaning the
Ikhwan as-Safa ] system. The doctrine of perfect correspondence contradicts the
emanationist ideas of this philosophical system.” (Widengren 1980: 305-306)
This kind of oversimplification is due to Widengren’s definition of the analogy,
which is much narrower than in the present study: he restricts the analysis solely
to one form of microcosmism: to explicit comparisons (see 1.4.2). I agree with
Widengren that explicit forms of the idea have received many of theft elements
from early mythologies, although not even those can be traced back to mythologi¬
cal sources alone. As will be seen in the next subsection, Widengren is not alone

17

in his critical views, but usually Neoplatonic philosophy has been seen as a tradi¬
tion which is closely connected with the microcosm-macrocosm analogy.

1.2.2 Microcosm as a Philosophical Concept 7

Various ideas in the background of Greek philosophical microcosmism have their
roots in Presocratic philosophy, in the views presented by such thinkers as Anax-
imandros, Heraclitus, Democritus and Pythagoras 8 . Allers (1944: 343) actually
claims that in the texts of these Presocratics all the elements of later Greek micro-
cosmic speculation are implied and “new elements were added only in the first
centuries of the Christian era, with the influence of Oriental philosophies on the
one hand, and the new conception of man, founded on the Christian doctrine, on
the other”.

The first more extensive philosophical elaborations of microcosmism were
produced by Plato. Being the first known thinker to broadly develop the analogy
as a philosophical concept, he has been thought to have formed the basis for all
microcosmic speculation after him (see, e.g., Barkan 1975: 8) and, as often hap¬
pens in the history of philosophy, it has been connected strictly to this one person
and to one tradition. The most important dialogues from this perspective are Ti¬
maeus, The Republic and Philebos. Barkan (1975: 8) distinguishes two basic sup¬
positions behind Plato’s microcosmism. The first one, appearing, for instance, in
the cosmology of Timaeus, is the way of seeing cosmos as a living creature. This
is probably the most popular form of the analogy and appears in various tradi¬
tions. The second sees to the world as “a copy in the transitory world of ‘becom¬
ing’ of a divine original which exists in the world of‘being’”. In addition to these
forms, Plato develops the analogy in various formulations, for example as part of
his epistemology.

If scholars approaching microcosmism from the mythological perspective are
sometimes eager to reduce the whole idea to mythology, a similar problem can be
recognized in philosophical studies on the topic. This has been noted, for instance,
by Anders Olerud (1951: 3-4). In his study on the analogy in Plato’s Timaeus,
Olerad criticizes previous research for thinking of Greek philosophical microcos-

I have restricted my examination of the Greek tradition to the philosophical perspective
alone, although the analogy forms an important part in the thought of Antiquity in various
other disciplines as well. Vitruvius, for example, bases his architectural theory on ideal
proportional correspondence between the human body, the temple and the universe. The
Vitruvian theory and various artistic theories based on it are particularly interesting when
microcosmism and its influence are examined from the perspective of aesthetics (see, e.g.,
Panofsky 1970: 82-138).

Pythagoras is believed to be the first to employ the term “cosmos” for the harmonic order
prevailing in the universe (Allers 1944: 343).

18

mism, in particular that of Plato, as an independent tradition separate from the
mythological one. According to him, the idea in Greek philosophy should not be
examined as a separate tradition, but as a notion springing from, at least partly, the
same sources as the “oriental” or mythological one. He also disapproves of the
views presented by some scholars that Platonic microcosmism would be a similar
but more sophisticated form of the idea than its mythological predecessors. As
Olemd (1951: 99-102) emphasizes, Platonic interpretations of the analogy were
influenced, not only by Pre-Socratic philosophy and natural philosophy based
upon it, but also by Orphism. According to him, the fusion of these two traditions
is the particular characteristic of microcosmism in Tinmens.

In spite of his extensive interest in the idea, the term “microcosm” does not
appear in Plato’s dialogues. It is Aristotle who is considered to be the fust philos¬
opher opposing the microcosm with the macrocosm and employing the term mi¬
crocosm in that context (Conger 1922: xiv). 9 For him, however, a metaphysical
meaning for the analogy is not essential. Hence, there is a fundamental difference
in the meaning given to microcosmism between the Platonic and Aristotelian tra¬
ditions. It is these metaphysical and metaphorical interpretations which we will
return to below (see 1.3.1).

According to Conger (1922: 15), the Stoics use the analogy in quite a similar
manner to Plato: they employ the argument, but the term microcosm is absent in
their writings. In Stoicism, the analogy often appears in the realm of ethics, and
virtue is linked with imitation of the surrounding world. The Stoics, however,
shifted the reference and did not draw a parallel between man and the city-state, as
was usually done in earlier microcosmic ethics, but contrasted man and larger
entities, such as the universe as a whole. (Jonas 1963: 248) Robert Durling (1975:
98-100) presents some microcosmic topics in Seneca’s Naturales quaestiones and
finds there, for instance, analogies between the life cycle of man and the cosmic
cycle and comparisons between the human body and the earth. Also the astrologi¬
cal aspect of the analogy is strongly present in Seneca’s work.

Platonic microcosmism continues in Late Antiquity when it is taken to an es¬
sential position by many Neoplatonic thinkers. The analogy has sometimes even
been considered a particularly Neoplatonic idea: Elmer O’Brien (1964: 25) claims
that the Neoplatonic system was the fust system to be wholly compatible with it.
Neoplatonic cosmology is based on the idea that reality as a whole is constituted
of different hypostases, all of them emanating from the One and finally returns to
its origin, the One. Man takes the final position in this hierarchical construction as

The term appears in the second book of Physics VIII, in a context in which Aristotle
examines the beginning of motion and explains that if animals can set themselves in motion,
why not the universe: “And if in a lesser cosmos (juiKpog Koapog), why not in a greater, and if
in the cosmos, why not in the unlimited?” (Trans. Wicksteed and Comford 1970)

19

the creature with the ability to ascend to the higher parts of reality. This kind of
system surely forms congenial flames for the microcosmic human being - the last
entity portraying the cyclic order of reality in its entirety. Some scholars have,
however, indicated some difficulties in the microcosm-macrocosm analogy as part
of the Neoplatonic system. Jacques Schlanger (1968: 313-316), for instance, in
his study on the thought of Shelomo ibn Gabirol, accuses Neoplatonists of inco¬
herence regarding then' microcosmism. According to Schlanger, the all-
encompassing entity among the created would not produce problems in the Aris¬
totelian eternal universe, but does when it is included into Neoplatonic emanation-
ism:

Le microcosme, pour etre le reflet ou 1’image du macrocosme, tout entier dans sa linea-
rite ontologique, ne peut etre rattache a aucun point de la hierarchie en particulier. [...]

S’il n’y qu’une hierarchie unique de l’etre, rhomme-microcosme n’a pas sa place dans
cette hierarchie. Pour etre l’image du tout, il ne peut en etre une partie. (Schlanger
1968:316)

Allers (1944: 357) also points out a difficulty in combining Neoplatonism and
microcosmism. Even though the lower level of reality is generated from the high¬
er and forms a reflection of it, there is an assumption in Neoplatonic emanation-
ism that the lower is essentially different from the higher. Hence, man can be a
symbol or an image of reality as a whole, but, as Allers remarks, it would be im¬
possible for a man, as a being of the lower material world, to contain in him the
higher spiritual hypostases. According to Allers, this fundamental problem has
been solved by combining Neopythagorean ideas with Neoplatonism or by under¬
standing the microcosmic position as a specific feature of man instead of that of
an individual human being.

Despite accusations of incoherence, Neoplatonists have been among the most
eager to develop the idea in the history of philosophy and roots for later elabora¬
tions have often been found in Neoplatonic sources. Marina Paola Banchetti-
Robino (2006: 25) argues that the “analogy, at least as found in later Western tra¬
dition has its roots in Neoplatonic philosophy”. Though the idea, in my opinion,
cannot be reduced to purely Neoplatonic sources, Neoplatonism surely forms an
important source for Islamic microcosmism. This is due to the sources Islamic
philosophers employed. The Platonic tradition in its mediaeval Islamic interpreta¬
tion is strongly influenced by its Neoplatonic interpretations. The transmission of
the Platonic tradition to mediaeval Islamic thinkers is unclear and there is no evi¬
dence that Islamic philosophers were actually familiar with any original dialogues
of Plato, or it seems likely that they were only known in the form of epitomes.
Timaeus, for example, was, according to Walbridge (2000: 88-95), probably
transmitted to Islamic philosophers in Galen’s epitome, as a part of the larger cor¬
pus of epitomes of the dialogues. Plato was also known to Islamic philosophers

20

through Aristotle, whose works were for the most part known in Arabic transla¬
tions. Thus, Platonism in the Islamic tradition was dominated by interpretations
made of it by Late Antiquity thinkers and Plato was mostly understood through
Neoplatonism. Neoplatonism usually appears in the form of a combination of var¬
ious philosophical and mystical traditions which was probably one of the things
that enabled the inclusion of the microcosmic idea. 10

One intellectual tradition of Ancient Greece which has often been seen as
closely related to microcosmism is the Hermetic tradition. The texts located under
this obscure umbrella of ideologies and the overall definition of the Hermetic tra¬
dition as such are disputed questions. 11 Usually works forming the basis for the
Greek Hermetic tradition are dated between 100 and 300 AD. In the traditional
view, the most characteristic feature of Hermetic philosophy is considered to be
eclecticism: Greek popular philosophy, Platonism and Stoicism and, for example,
Jewish and Persian influence can be recognized in texts included in the Hermetic
Corpus. (Yates 2002: 2-3) Thought expressed in these works cannot be regarded
as pure philosophy, but more as an ideology in between philosophy and religion.
Hermetic literature has been traditionally divided into two branches: the philo¬
sophical branch and the technical branch, which includes different scientific 12

De Smet (2010: 85) points out some characteristics of the diffusion of Plato’s ideas in the
Islamic world. Firstly, he affirms that the paraphrases, through which the writings were
transmitted, often reflected Neoplatonic views aiming at forming a harmony between the
views of Plato and Aristotle. In addition to this, Plato’s notions were passed to the Islamic
thinkers through philosophical maxims from the thinkers of Late Antiquity. These maxims
have been included in gnomologies, encyclopaedic works and in popular philosophy
translated into Arabic. Lastly, De Smet remarks that, even if Plato’s transmission happened
partly orally, textual transmission played most predominant role in it.

As van Bladel (2009: 18) points out, in the Greek context the Hermetic tradition or
Hermeticism has been used to refer on the one hand, to a philosophical system or, on the
other hand, to a literary genre. The texts included under the title “Hermetic” have also varied.
Sometimes a mere reference to Hermes has been enough to characterize a work as
"Hermetic”, sometimes texts developing alchemical theories or simply all marginal or
“esoteric” writings have been defined using this cryptic term. In Arabic Hermetica Van
Bladel includes only the texts attributed to Hermes and, hence, the term Hermetic tradition is
used merely of the “tradition of textual transmission of writings attributed to Hermes” (21).
This excludes, for instance, the works attributed to Agathodaemon, Asclepius and Pseudo-
Apollonius of Tyana, all of which having usually been seen as Hermetic. Van Bladel also
criticizes the term "Hermetic influence” for its vagueness, (van Bladel 2009: 18-21)

From today’s perspective these scientific branches are regarded as pseudosciences, but the
term is problematic in premodern contexts. Although magic was quite clearly counted
outside the “serious” sciences, the position of such fields as astrology and alchemy was not
that clear. Astrology was often regarded as a part of the scientific worldview, although some
areas of it met with opposition from very early on. The border between sciences and
pseudosciences varied but was certainly different from the modem view. For the sake of
consistency, in this study I will - in the case of both Antiquity and the Middle Ages - be
referring to such fields as astrology and alchemy simply as sciences.

21

texts treating astrology, alchemy and magic with references to the mystical figure
of Hermes Trismegistus. 13 The microcosmic idea appears in both of these branch¬
es.

A basic element in the works traditionally regarded as Hermetic philosophical
texts is the view of reality as a many-layered whole in which correspondences
between different levels prevail. The lower is seen as a sign of the higher, an idea
that culminates in Tabula Smaragdina, which is a text known in later Hermeti-
cism through the Arabic Pseudo-Apollonian work Sirr al-khalTqa (Ebeling 2007:
50). 14 In the frames of this kind of cosmology, man as a level which includes
characteristics corresponding to other levels is seen as obvious. In Asclepius,
man’s uniqueness as a combination of the divine soul, which enables him to rise
up to heaven, and the corporeal body, which ties him up to the material world, is
emphasized throughout the work. Microcosmism connected with self-knowledge
and with the idea of man as an image of God also appears in Asclepius'.

The master of eternity is the first god, the world is second, mankind is third [...] on ac¬
count of mankind’s divine composition, it seems right to call him a well-ordered world,
though Kosmos in Greek would be better. Mankind knows himself and knows the
world: thus, it follows that he is mindful of what his role is and of what is useful to
him; also, that he recognizes what interests he should serve, giving greatest thanks and
praise to god and honouring his image but not ignoring that he, too, is the second image
of god, who has two images, the world and mankind. (Copenhaver 1992: 72-73)

The analogy has an essential role in the scientific branch of the Greek Hermetic
tradition as well. Astrology was an important discipline for the authors of these
texts, and microcosmism has throughout its history been closely allied with it.
These thinkers, for instance, assumed a correspondence between divine beings
and heavenly bodies and deduced from this different theories of astrological med¬
icine (Festugiere 1950: 92, 123-124). 15 Later, correspondence between man and
the heavenly spheres formed an important part of the Islamic microcosm-
macrocosm analogy. Even though the routes by which Hermetic works reached
the Islamic world are difficult to define, Sabians of Harran are considered to have
been significant in the transmission of Greek Hermetic texts, particularly as re¬
gards their astrological branch (Green 1992: 169-174).

Even though this division is employed by many scholars, it should be acknowledged, as
Yates (2002: 47) points out, that these two traditions cannot be entirely separated from each
other.

For more on Sirr al-khaliqa , see 2.3.1.

Iatromathematics, a form of astrological medicine developed and practised by thinkers
connected with the Hermetic tradition, is a concrete example of a discipline based wholly on
the sympathy between microcosm and macrocosm (Ebeling 2007: 22).

22

1.2.3 Judeo-Christian Tradition and Microcosmism

As Levy (1967: 641) mentions, the microcosmic idea was not something as inte¬
gral to Jewish and Christian doctrines as it was, for instance, to the Gnostic reli¬
gious system. It confronted opposition in both Jewish and Christian circles and
some important thinkers, like Maimonides (d. 1204), wrote against it. 16 Some ap¬
plied the analogy only as a metaphor, among them Thomas Aquinas (d. 1274).
There are, however, representatives of the Judeo-Christian tradition who devel¬
oped the microcosm-macrocosm analogy and adopted it as part of their religious
philosophy. Some of their ideas originating in the biblical notion of man also in¬
fluenced Islamic thought.

The first salient Jewish thinker who was interested in man as the microcosm
was Philo (d. c. 50 AD). Philo based his microcosmism on the idea of homo ima¬
go dei. His interest was in creating a synthesis of Greek philosophy and Jewish
thought avoiding all possible forms of anthropomorphism. Philo found two ways
to do that, both connected with the idea of the human being as the summary of
creation. According to the first, God is to the universe what man’s soul is to his
body, and the resemblance between man and God applies to the human soul, not
to the bodily aspect of man. The second option suggests that God made man, not
in his image, but after his image - Logos 17 , the image of God, which is an inter¬
mediate level in the process of creation. Man is a copy of the antedated creation
and a model of that which follows him. (Conger 1922: 16-17)

Some of the earliest Christian thinkers did not support the microcosm-
macrocosm analogy. This was mostly due to the controversies with the Gnostics.
However, when Christianity started to become established, microcosmism gained
some space in the theology of the Church Fathers. It had a significant role in dis¬
cussion on the bodily aspect of man and it formed an important tool against nega¬
tive attitudes towards the human body, which were spread by Christian thinkers
influenced by Neoplatonism and, in particular, by Origen (d. 254). He saw the
body as a worldly prison which draws man towards sin. Because microcosmism is
based on the idea of man as a combination of the corporeal and the spiritual, and,
for this, the body is considered to be a natural part of the whole, Origen’s oppo¬
nents used the analogy as justification for their views. (Conger 1922: 30-31) One
of the early Church Fathers, especially fond of the idea of man being a miniature
of creation, was Gregory of Nyssa (d. c. 394). He uses it in his On the Soul and

16 Interestingly, Maimonides is known to have criticized Yosef ibn Saddiq’s work The Book of
the Microcosm (see below) for following the ideas of the Ikliwan as-Safa’ (Zonta2011).

17

Even if Philo avoids personalization of the Logos, his attachments of it to the highest priest
or Moses could form an interesting basis to approach the microcosmic idea from the
perspective of the perfect man or the human archetype as the microcosm. On various
interpretations of the concept of Logos in Philo’s thought, see Williamson 1989: 103-143.

23

the Resurrection (Greogory of Nyssa: 28 A-D), for instance, drawing an analogy
between the soul and the divine: man as the microcosm can observe the existence
of the soul contemplating himself and deduce from this the presence of the divine
as a dominating power in the universe.

A salient mediaeval Christian figure elaborating microcosmism was Johannes
Scotus Eriugena (d. 877) and various traces of it can be found in his works. One
worth mentioning has to do with the sympathetic relationship between the two
images of God: man and the world, the microcosm and the macrocosm. Scotus
Eriugena defines the human being as an intermediate level between God and the
created universe. Man forms a link between the created world and the divine
working as a turning point between processio (the creation or coming into being)
and reditus (returning to God). Thus, the state of the union between God and crea¬
tion, which is reached in salvation, is anticipated in the human being. (Otten 1991:
110-111) This kind of middle position of man is a regular feature in monotheistic
interpretations of the Neoplatonic system. An interesting feature in Scotus’s theo¬
ry is his idea of the influence that microcosmic man has on the universe. Since
man’s good deeds and piety make it possible for the world to return to its origin,
also the sin committed by man acquires cosmic proportions - the sympathy be¬
tween man and the created world causes man’s sinful acts to influence the world
as a whole. By committing a sin man damages his own role as imago dei and, un¬
balancing the equilibrium in himself, he unbalances the ontological harmony of
the universe. (Otten 1991: 112—114) 18

Another mediaeval Christian developer of the analogy was Hildegard of
Bingen (d. 1179), a sister of the Benedictine order, who worked as a healer, com¬
poser and artist. She wrote texts concerning, among other things, the natural sci¬
ences. She claims to have received personal revelation of all creation as macro¬
cosm and microcosm, and this dominated her thought. Tier notion of the Cosmic
Christ, who made it possible for the human being to experience spiritual princi¬
ples, is closely connected with microcosmism. Elildegard’s views had great influ¬
ence in her time and later during the Renaissance. (Tymieniecka 2006: xii-xiii)

During the Middle Ages, Jewish philosophical theories concerning microcos¬
mism resembled more the Islamic ones than those of Christian thinkers and often
they actually formed a part of the same tradition. Many Jewish philosophers in
Islamic areas developed the idea and were strongly influenced by Muslim think¬
ers. For instance, Shelomo ibn Gabirol (d. 1058) absorbed the analogy in its vari-

According to Conger (1922: 33—35), microcosmism is also present in Scotus Eriugena’s
epistemological views. Scotus Eriugena draws an analogy between the order of the heavenly
bodies and the modes of knowing. He also attaches the analogy to the Trinity: for him, the
tripartite division of knowledge into physical, logical and ethical branches can be seen as an
image of the Trinity of God.

24

ous forms characteristic to Neoplatonic cosmology. In addition to Neoplatonic
microcosmism, he also uses the widespread explanation of the correspondence
between the elements and bodily humours for the existing analogy between the
human body and the material world. The instrumental value of microcosmism is
acknowledged by Ibn Gabirol, and he considers microcosmic man to be a means
to acquire knowledge of the surrounding reality through self-knowledge.
(Schlanger 1968: 314-315) 19

The verse “And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see
God” (Job 19:26) appears in the texts of many Jewish philosophers connecting the
microcosm-macrocosm analogy with self-knowledge. Especially during the Mid¬
dle Ages, the passage was understood to refer to the requirement of self¬
contemplation and to the idea that knowledge of God could be inferred from the
created world. Later in Jewish microcosmic speculation this became a popular
view and received various interpretations during the 12th and 13th centuries
(Altmann 1969: 23-25). 211 The question of self-knowledge and the microcosmic
position of man also attracted Yosef ibn Saddiq (d. 1149), who was among the
most important mediaeval microcosmists. He even named his major work The
Book of the Microcosm (Sefer 'Olam Qatan ) 21 and is, according to Mauro Zonta
(2011), the first mediaeval Jewish thinker who has without doubt received direct
influence from Rasd’ilIkhwan as-Safd’ in his microcosmic speculation. 2 "

Kabbalah forms its own significant tradition of microcosmism in Jewish
thought. Most importantly, a central kabbalistic idea of Selirot, the mystical at¬
tributes of God, is in many ways connected with the analogy. Sefirot are described
as a tree which forms a kind of skeleton of the universe as a whole. Sefirot also
find their place in the body parts of Adam Qadmon, the primordial man. (Scholem
1995: 214-215) The theory of Sefirot has been connected with microcosmism in
some more marginal interpretations of the idea as well. In the later Kabbalistic
tradition, the founder of the prophetic Kabbalah Abraham Abulafia (d. after
1291), for instance, develops it at the level of the intellect and identifies Sefirot
with separate intellects that are all found in the Active Intellect. Prophecy is a
mystical union between the human intellect and the Active Intellect, and, as a

As Schlanger (1968: 94-97) points out, it is possible, although not confirmed, that Ibn
Gabirol received influence from the Ikhwan as-Safa’ in some of his microcosmic views.

Self-knowledge leading to knowledge of God appeared in the Jewish tradition for the first
time in some Karaite texts during the ninth and tenth centuries. Karaite authors, according to
Altmann, adapted it from Islamic authors. (Altmann 1969: 3)

The work was originally written in Arabic under the title al- ‘Alain as-saghir , but the text has
only been preserved in its Hebrew translation.

On the influence of the Ikhwan in Yosef ibn Saddiq’s work, see also Doctor 1895. Another
mediaeval Jewish author who is known to have been influenced by the Ikhwan in his
microcosmic views was Moshe ibn Ezra (d. after 1138) (Zonta 2011).

25

consequence of the union, man receives all ten Sefirot into his particular intellect.
(Tirosh-Samuelson 2003: 233-234) 23

As we can see, important themes in both Jewish and Christian microcosmic
traditions have been the homo imago dei theme and the emphasis on man in the
centre of the created world. This was a familiar aspect of the analogy previously
as well, but since the monotheistic theologians it had much greater impact in all
microcosmic speculation. In the hands of mediaeval theologians, Jewish as well as
Christian, the idea of man as the microcosm, according to Conger, “served as a
convenient and uncritical method of reconciling religion with the natural sciences,
which even then were beginning to raise questions and difficulties for the faithful”
(Conger 1922: 52). After the Early Modern period, the scientific approach to reali¬
ty became prevalent, and metaphysical as well as mystical perspectives were
largely replaced by a scientific worldview. Concurrently, the microcosm-
macrocosm analogy was driven to the margin in Western philosophical thought
(Tymieniecka 2006: xiv). In contemporary Western religious thought microcos-
mism has influenced, for instance, such spiritualistic movements as New Age re¬
ligion (Hanegraaff 1996: 400). 24

1.3 PREVIOUS CLASSIFICATIONS

The microcosm-macrocosm analogy has been, to some extent, recognized as a
theme worth of study by historians of philosophy. However, the trend of treating

Also such early Jewish mystical texts as Shi ur Ooma, a text pertaining to Hekhalot literature
and declaring extreme anthropomorphism of God, can be interpreted to reflect some forms of
microcosmism (for more on Shi ur Qomd, see Scholem 1995: 63-67). In later Jewish
mysticism from the 16th century onwards, the microcosmic idea appears especially in the
Lurianic Kabbalah. Scholem (1995: 269) points out the position of Lurianic Kabbalah in the
development of microcosmism in the Jewish mystical tradition, and writes “the tendency to
interpret human life and behaviour as symbols of a deeper life, the conception of man as a
micro-cosmos and of the living God as a macro-anthropos, has never been more clearly
expressed and driven to its farthest consequences”. This can be seen, for example, in the
doctrine that Tikkun - which is symbolically expressed as the birth of God’s personality -
corresponds to the process of mundane history and all that man does is somehow related to
the happenings at these other levels of reality (274-275).

When it comes to the present state of microcosmism, Tymieniecka (2006: xiv) states that in
contemporary Western thought there is “a deeper enlightenment renewing the human mind”
which can be seen, for example, as a growing interest in Islamic metaphysics including the
microcosm-macrocosm analogy. This change is, in her opinion, bringing back the two lost
perspectives, mystical and metaphysical, to Western thought. In the Islamic context,
considering the analogy as a 'perennial’ idea and calling for its revival is on the agenda of,
for instance, Seyyed Hossein Nasr (see, e.g., 1987: 216). Despite the valuable academic
contribution of both of these philosophers to the study of history of microcosmism, in these
contexts it is at times difficult to say when the author moves from critical academic
discussion to his/her own religious and philosophical views.

26

this subject seems to have ended about half a century ago. Thus, in order to trace
the historical development of the analogy, one has to rely on slightly outdated
studies. To my knowledge, there are only two monographs published on the gen¬
eral history of the idea in the history of philosophy. That of Adolf Meyer (1900),
which was the pioneering work in the field, has been criticized by both Conger
(1922: xv) and Allers (1944: 319) for omissions and complete ignorance of some
branches of the analogy. In 1922, Conger himself published a monograph Theo¬
ries of Macrocosms and Microcosms in the History of Philosophy. Conger’s work
forms an overview of the history of the idea in the philosophy of the Atlantic and
Mediterranean regions. Conger emphasizes mediaeval and modern philosophy.
Not surprisingly, since his intent is to sketch the general Western history of mi-
crocosmism, he has been criticized for superficiality (see, e.g., Olerud 1951: 5-6).
Allers (1944) contributed to the study of the topic with an extensive article about
the analogy in Western philosophy, which is particularly useful for its systematic
approach: the classification it employs is enlightening and a valuable analytical
tool for various kinds of materials. In addition to these general studies, there are
several more specific studies on microcosmism of a particular philosopher or
philosophical tradition. 25

In most systematic studies, the idea is analysed through a classification based
on the form of the analogy or the meaning given to it. Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka
(2006: x-xi) mentions three perspectives of microcosmism: mystical, which is
attached to salvation; reflective or metaphysical, which could be understood as
reasons for everything, “rational linkage of events, their causes and first princi¬
ples”; and scientific microcosmism. These perspectives are said to “mutually in¬
fluence and modulate each other”, and, according to Tymieniecka, among others
Plato approaches the microcosm-macrocosm analogy from all these three perspec¬
tives. Nikolay Milkov (2006: 44-45) distinguishes three traditions in microcosmic
speculation which resemble the perspectives defined by Tymieniecka, adding
some essential characteristics to them. The first one, also connected to mysticism,
stresses the unity of all life, which is considered to be based on parallel propor¬
tions between different entities. This kind of microcosmism usually assumes the
existence of the World Soul and is typical of esoteric philosophy like Hermeticism
and occult sciences. The scientific approach is in Milkov’s view characterized by
looking for similar orders prevailing at different layers of reality. In this category
Milkov counts any part of a whole which represents or mirrors the whole." 6 The

The study on the topic in Islamic context will be presented in 1.4.1.

As Milkov (2006: 44) points out, this definition does not designate as scientific
microcosmism only sciences regarded nowadays as pseudosciences, but includes also, for
example, the idea prevailing in modem neurology that each part of the brain represents a
certain part of the body or its faculties.

27

third form accentuates the unity formed by different parts which follow certain
principles. 27

In this chapter, I will focus in more detail on two classifications which I find
most relevant in the context of this study, namely Barkan’s and Allers’s systema¬
tizations. Barkan (1975) examines the microcosm-macrocosm analogy as a corpo¬
real metaphor in Renaissance poetry. He divides the study into three parts: the
analogy between man and the cosmos from the perspective of natural philosophy;
the idea connected to a commonwealth; and aesthetic interpretations. Allers
(1944), on the other hand, employs a six-partite division: elementaristic; structur¬
al; holistic; symbolistic; psychological and metaphorical. 2N I will introduce Al¬
lers’s and Barkan’s classifications under four categories. It needs to be empha¬
sized that the classifications are rough divisions: what Allers (1944: 331) main¬
tains regarding his systematic approach is that any form of the analogy rarely ap¬
pears in a pure form - single interpretations mingle and overlap.

1.3.1 Metaphysical and Metaphorical Microcosmisms

A basic distinction which seems to be behind most systematic divisions of micro-
cosmism has to do with the general meaning given to the analogy: is the idea
thought to have some metaphysical meaning or is it used as a mere metaphor?
This kind of distinction is, however, rarely explicit or even acknowledged, and
some consider it impossible to strictly define the difference between metaphysical
and metaphorical uses of the idea. 29

Allers (1944: 331-337) defines the metaphorical microcosmism as a category
on its own and refers to it as one of his six categories. The metaphorical analogy
can, according to him, take different forms, but the combining feature of all these
kinds of theories is that the analogy between the microcosm and the macrocosm is
a mere figure of speech with no metaphysical significance. Referring to metaphor¬
ical and psychological analogies (excluding some forms of the latter to which I

In addition to these classifications, Meyer’s (1900: 104) division is worth mentioning. He
divides microcosmism according to the meaning given to it into four categories:
mythological-physical, psychical, metaphysical and sociological. Olerud (1951: 7), on the
other hand, recognizes in Plato’s Timaeus three different forms of analogy, which he defines
as morphologic, physiologic and psychological.

Allers’s classification has been commented on in the Islamic context as well: Takeshita
(1987: 74-108) uses this division in his examination of the Islamic microcosm-macrocosm
analogy.

Olerud (1951: 7), for instance, criticizes this kind of division. According to him, it is not
always possible to define whether the metaphoric analogy also has realistic dimension or not.
This same difficulty, however, surely applies to all classifications concerning microcosmism:
the classifications are rarely comprehensive and no variation usually appears in a pure form.

28

will return later, see 1.3.4), Allers (1944: 353) notes that “these two interpreta¬
tions may be opposed, as no longer genuinely microcosmistic, to those listed be¬
fore [meaning elementaristic, structural, holistic and symbolistic] in which the
notion of the microcosm retains its full value and metaphysical significance”.
Hence, according to him, all other forms of his division approach microcosmism
as a metaphysical fact except for metaphorical and some psychological analogies.

In the philosophy of Antiquity, the distinction between metaphysical and met¬
aphorical microcosmisms seems to follow the line drawn between Platonic and
Aristotelian philosophy. Mystically oriented Platonists are thought to more natu¬
rally assume the analogy to be a metaphysical parallelism. As Olemd (1951: 2)
declares concerning the analogies in Timaeus, they are not metaphors, but identi¬
fications. Followers of Aristotle, instead, treat the analogy as a mere figure of
speech. In the research of microcosmism in Western philosophy, Aristotle is often
referred to as the father of the metaphorical branch. As Allers (1944: 383) points
out, “man, to him, is not simply a microcosm, but he is such a one only ‘some¬
how’.” Though Aristotle employs the term, and, for instance, the notion of the
universe as a living organism, the analogy does not contain the same metaphysical
meaning as it does in Plato’s texts (Allers 1944: 383).

Barkan does not draw a line between metaphysical and metaphorical micro¬
cosmisms, but he presents a distinction between their figurative and literal forms.
Barkan defines these two strands in the following way:

The figurative microcosm, which views man - rather than his body - as a precis of all
creation and seeks in that perception a spiritual and intellectual truth, and the literal mi¬
crocosm, which assumes an equivalence of man’s body and the cosmos and uses this
equivalence as some sort of scientific key to the nature of the world and man. (Barkan
1975:28)

According to Barkan (1975: 28), figurative and literal occurrences of the analogy
have varied according to their contexts. As a metaphor in literature microcosmism
has occurred mostly in a joined form, including both figurative and literal aspects.
In his opinion, however, natural philosophy has employed the analogy mostly in
its purely figurative form.

As can be seen, Barkan’s division is quite different from Allers’s. Since the
former’s study concerns the use of the microcosm as a metaphor in literature, the
metaphysical meaning given to the analogy is not relevant. Thus the distinction
between figurative and literal analogies is about the concreteness of the analogy:
the literal is about the human body and the figurative about the human soul. As for
Allers, this kind of distinction cannot be found in his classification.

29

1.3.2 Cosmological Approaches

Some presentations of cosmology describe the cosmos as a whole through man, or
- in fact more often - vice versa, man through cosmos. These kinds of analogies,
in which the surrounding reality as a whole forms the macrocosm, can be referred
to as cosmological microcosm-macrocosm analogies. The analogy forms a part of
various kinds of cosmological systems, and Barkan (1975: 14) divides cosmologi¬
cal microcosmism into four. The first one, chemical geocosm, approaches the
world as a mixture of four elements. Astral geocosm, on the other hand, concen¬
trates on the cosmos from the perspective of the heavenly cosmos which includes
both physical and spiritual aspects. When the cosmos is approached as a numeri¬
cal geocosm , mathematical relations are the main focus. Cosmologies that are
primarily interested in the cosmos as a natural geocosm assume it to constitute the
objects of this world as they are immediately perceived by the senses. According
to Barkan, these aspects of the cosmological analogy often appear as combined. In
most cases, all these four forms of the analogy seem to fall under the category of
either elementaristic or structural microcosmism in Allers’s classification.

Usually developers of the microcosmic idea assume that man is constituted of
the same elements as the reality which surrounds him. Allers (1944: 321-322)
defines this view as elementaristic microcosmism. This theory places man in the
middle position of the universe; man is the only being including the whole crea¬
tion and is “the bond between the material and the spiritual”. Man is often thought
to include the four elements of which the cosmos is composed and these elements
are not only included in the human being, they are also arranged in a manner simi¬
lar to that of the cosmos. Man’s unique all-encompassing position can, according
to Allers, be traced back to Aristotle’s theory of the three souls. As Allers de¬
clares, the elementaristric theory itself does not encourage the most elevated phil¬
osophical discussion. But more than anything, it is an analogy that defines man’s
place in the cosmos. (Allers 1944: 344-348)

Structural microcosmism is a term that Allers employs to refer to man as a
summary of the universal order. “If human nature is envisioned in such a manner,
man is not simply subjected to the universal laws, because he is part of the uni¬
verse, but he is himself, as it were, these laws, and he may become aware of them
by looking into himself’ (Allers 1944: 322). The structural microcosm-
macrocosm analogy is divided into two branches. In cosmocentric structural mi¬
crocosmism, the laws and harmonies of the cosmos are found - analogical or
identical - in man. The parallel counterparts also influence each other, though the
direction of the impact varies between interpretations of the theory. Man can be
seen either as an active actor in the function and perfection of the universe or as a
passive receiver of the influence Horn above - an idea that is closely related to
astrology. Anthropocentric structural microcosmism concentrates on man and

30

considers the cosmos as a large man, meganthropos. The notion of the World-Soul
governing the material world can be included in this kind of analogy. (Allers
1944: 322-323)

1.3.3 Sociological Parallelism

According to Barkan (1975: 62), it is natural for a man to find unity amid all the
diversity in himself: “the human body is the only, as well as the most obvious,
way of understanding a unity of diversity.” Thus, it is also an innate feature of a
man to define the human collective as something parallel to himself. Barkan di¬
vides the development of the sociological microcosm-macrocosm analogy into
three phases. In the first phase the underlying idea becomes evident in the devel¬
opment of language. In many languages, there are various terms which refer to the
human collective and its hierarchical structure and have then origin in the human
body. ’ 0 In the second phase, the original idea of the correspondence is forgotten,
even though it affects the fundamental structures of human thought. This phase, as
well, is perceivable linguistically: “we are not likely, upon seeing the word mem¬
bers, to think immediately of arms and legs even though the human body is the
source for both the ideas and the means of its expression.” In the third phase, the
analogy is reborn and employed either to express or to prove the original organic
theory. (Barkan 1975: 62-63)

In Allers’s (1944: 367-369) classification, the sociological aspect of micro-
cosmism is considered an interpretation of holistic microcosmism. In the back¬
ground of the holistic analogy, lies the tenet of man’s way of creating order
around him. This order is a replica of orders occurring in man and at different
layers of reality and, thus, society is a representation of this order at one level.
Allers emphasizes that in sociological holistic microcosmism society is presup¬
posed to be a living organism, be this supposition merely an analogy or an actual
assumption of the human community as a living person. In addition to sociologi¬
cal holistic microcosmism, Allers (1944: 325-326) mentions as a variation of the
holistic form aesthetic holistic microcosmism. Since it was not, according to him,
developed during the period of his study, he does not define it in detail, but con¬
nects it with such maxims as “God as the great artist” and “to live one’s life as a
work of art”.

Influences of microcosmism in general can be found in the everyday speech of many
languages, e.g., such sayings as "Mother Earth” imply anthropomorphic conceptualization of
the surrounding reality. Fuad I. Khuri (2001: 18) examines the human body and the Arabic
language. Among words linked with both social gradation and the human body he mentions
the plural words heads (ru 'us), faces (wujahd ’), eyes (a yah) (all referring to leaders or
important people) and the word bust (sadr) (leader).

31

The reflection of society is not necessarily found in any human individual and
the microcosmic idea at the sociological level is sometimes connected with some
excellent individuals. In the Christian tradition, the church as an institution has
been thought to represent the body of Christ on earth. This has its origins in Paul’s
Epistles (1 Cor. 12: 12-31) (Barkan 1975: 67-69). At times the analogy is taken
from that mystical level to the corporeal world: in some analogies the actual body
of an individual person, for example, the body of the queen, has been described as
the reflection of the society she leads, and “the eyes, hands, and mind, which ear¬
lier are made to represent groups within the commonwealth, are given human
character and a total form in the person of the queen” (Barkan 1975: 87).

As Allers’s terminology indicates, the microcosm-macrocosm analogy that
seeks correspondences between man and the human society accentuates a holistic
notion of society: each individual has his place and task as part of society, and
there is no society without individuals. In addition to this, though the significance
of even the weakest members of the Body of Christ is emphasized in Paul’s epis¬
tle, the hierarchical structure of society and inequality between individuals is a
theme that this kind of parallelism inevitably highlights: like in the human organ¬
ism, some members are more vital than others. Thus, anthropomorphic representa¬
tions of society have been employed for political purposes in defence of a hierar¬
chical society, for example, in Renaissance England (Barkan 1975: 77). 31

1.3.4 Microcosmic Theories and Knowledge

One may speak of ‘symbolistic’ microcosmism insofar as the microcosm is not con¬
ceived, either as obeying exactly the same laws as the macrocosm, or as duplicating
and reproducing on a minor scale the latter’s construction, but as ‘corresponding to’ or
being ‘symbolic of the universe, in its totality or some of its parts (Allers 1944: 326).

As an example of the symbolistic analogy Allers (1944: 371-377) mentions Py¬
thagorean thought, in which numbers are seen as lower level symbols or represen¬
tations of the cosmic harmony. This kind of conception is most easily perceptible
in the Pythagorean theory of music - in the idea that terrestrial music is a reflec¬
tion of celestial music, sounds produced by the motions of the heavenly spheres.
This is connected with microcosmism as well: “the fundamental identity of these
two musics makes man a microcosm because the principle here and there is the
same, namely the law of musical harmony.” Although the difference in the form
of the analogy is not necessarily huge between the structural and symbolistic
forms, the main difference between them is that the meaning given to the analogy

The sociological microcosmism has been used in the classics of political philosophy as well.
Thomas Hobbes draws a picture of the ideal society in the form of the body of a living
creature in his Leviathan.

32

is in the symbolistic form imperceptible: “things remain what they are, but they
acquire, in the light of symbolistic interpretation, another, higher significance be¬
sides their natural one” (Allers 1944: 370).

Symbolistic theories are connected to knowledge, because, in order to under¬
stand then' meanings, one needs to have special knowledge or, as Allers puts it, a
“code”. There are, however, microcosm-macrocosm analogies which harness the
microcosm purely to an epistemological concept. Allers (1944: 330-331) defines
as its own class the psychological microcosmism which assumes that man be¬
comes the microcosm through acquisition of knowledge. This appears, for exam¬
ple, in Plato’s Meno (81-86), in which the process of learning is explained as rec¬
ollection ( anamnesis ) of the objects of knowledge which man can, because of the
immortality of the soul, find in himself. Man actualizes a microcosm in his mind
when he achieves knowledge of the surrounding reality. Thus, the attainment of
the microcosm at the level of the human intellect is something man aims to
achieve. Barkan (1975: 33) as well sees the requirement of man’s active participa¬
tion for the attainment of the microcosmic state as a defining factor of this kind of
microcosmism which he calls epistemological. In spite of its obvious emphasis
on the spiritual aspect of man, Barkan surprisingly states that “the intersection of
the ideas of man as microcosm and his body as microcosm is what we might call
the epistemological microcosm”.

The psychological, or epistemological, microcosmism can, according to Al¬
lers (1944: 331), be divided into metaphysical and metaphorical interpretations
depending on the theory of knowledge. Following Platonic realism, the ideas of
the objects - their true natures known by man - are drawn into the human mind.
In this way, the psychological microcosm, which the acquired knowledge forms in
the mind, is something metaphysical. On the other hand, when knowledge is not
understood as something real drawn into the human mind, the psychological mi¬
crocosmism appears only in its metaphorical form. This distinction has to do with
the realities of the universals, and, again, the distinction is drawn between the Pla¬
tonic and Aristotelian views.

1.4 MICROCOSMISM IN THIS STUDY

Microcosmism is attached to the idea of man in Islamic tradition in various ways.
As pointed out previously in this chapter, the main purposes of this study are, on
the one hand, to examine the meaning and use of the microcosm-macrocosm
analogy in the Rasa 'il and related texts and, on the other, to scrutinize the position
of the Ikhwan in the development of Islamic microcosmism. In this subsection, I

This term is also used by Conger (1922: 22).

33

will define the more precise aims of each chapter. I will first briefly introduce
previous studies of the topic in the Islamic context. Then some general frames of
microcosmism in this study will be clarified. Lastly, I will more specifically de¬
fine the questions that I am posing for the corpus and outline the perspectives
from which I will approach them.

1.4.1 Previous Studies of the Islamic Microcosmic Idea

In general studies of the microcosmic idea, the contribution of Islamic thinkers in
its development has been recognized in all of the important studies. Conger (1922:
46-52) examines the ‘Mohammedan’ philosophy for some pages, concentrating
mainly on the Ikhwan as-Safa’. Allers (1944: 346) also mentions the influence of
the Ikhwan on later microcosmism, though seems to count the Islamic tradition as
a part of the Eastern tradition which he excludes from his study. However, the
research on Islamic philosophy still lacks a comparative and comprehensive study
of the microcosmic idea in all its variety and different interpretations. There is
neither a systematic examination of the origins of Islamic microcosmism nor of its
development and multiplicity in the hands of Islamic philosophers.

The analogy has been acknowledged in studies on some particular Islamic
thinkers and especially in the case of the Ikhwan as-Safa’. Masataka Takeshita
(1987: 74-108) and Seyyed Hossein Nasr (1978: 96-104) have dedicated chapters
to it in their dissertations mainly in the philosophy of the Rasd’il. As representa¬
tives of the so-called Philosophia Perennis often do, Nasr finds microcosmism an
important theme in Islamic philosophy and recurrently comments on it in Islamic
cosmology and sciences. In addition to critical academic work, some of his writ¬
ings on the topic are more speculative and related to his personal philosophical
views. This provides a problem in some other studies on the history of the analogy
as well, which is not unusual for topics related to present-day spirituality and mys¬
tically oriented philosophy. 3 ’

Some articles concentrating on the microcosmic idea from some specific per¬
spective have been published. Remi Brague (1997) has written an article compar¬
ing some forms of Islamic microcosmism to its Greek predecessors. Widengren
(1980: 298) “trace[s] this speculation back to its origin and demonstrate^] the
way in which it presumably reached the Brethren, but also how it was living on in
the Shi’ah movement” in his article “Macrocosmos-Microcosmos speculation in
the Rasa’il Ikhwan as-Safa and some Hurufi texts”. He concentrates on the
mythological roots of the microcosm-macrocosm analogy and related topics in
Islamic thought and manages to show that some anthropological and cosmological

See note 24.

34

views, such as microcosmism, “found their way into Hurufi circles thanks to the
spread in the Shi'ah movement of the doctrines found in the Writings of the Pure
Brethren” (Widengren 1980: 305). Microcosmism has also been of central inter¬
est, for example, in Alexander Altmann’s (1969) examination of self-knowledge
and Godefroid de Callatay’s (2005a), study on the mirror metaphor in the Rasa 'il.

To my knowledge the only extensive study on Islamic microcosmism is the
anthology of articles Islamic Philosophy and Occidental Phenomenology> on the
Perennial Issue of Microcosm and Macrocosm edited by Tymieniecka (2006). In
this work, there are some general articles on the analogy and its Islamic forms,
and some of its articles examine Islamic microcosmism and its relations to the
Western elaborations of the analogy. The comparative study of Islamic and West¬
ern philosophy is fruitful up to a point, but it often reduces the topic to a purely
philosophical question leaving out some essential aspects.

1.4.2 Broad Definition

As we can see, the importance of the microcosmic idea in Islamic thought has
been recognized in previous research. Some of its aspects have received attention
while others have been completely ignored. One of the problems in the study of
the topic is that the analogy often receives a narrow definition: many scholars ex¬
plore it from a specific perspective excluding its other formulations. Often the
examination has been restricted to the occurrence of the term alum saghTr or to
very explicit forms of the analogy. This has led to oversimplifications, as we can
see, for instance, in Brague’s (1997) and Widengren’s (1980) treatments, which
leave out some fundamental elements of the idea.

Milkov, who examines Lotze’s thought from the perspective of microcos¬
mism, notes that the term microcosm appears in Lotze’s texts only a few times,
although it is a fundamental feature of his philosophy. Concerning the reason for
the absence of the term he supposes that “this was a measure taken against the
danger that his work might be conceived in the old German tradition of micro-
cosmic studies a la Paracelsus and Jacob Bohme” (Milkov 2006: 44). Milkov may
be right, since in modern thought, the analogy surely has been a marginal idea
pertaining to the branches of philosophy that some have considered suspicious. Its
appearance with no connection to the term has, however, a much longer history
than the term “microcosm” and, at all times, microcosmism has been elaborated
with no connection to the term. As noted earlier, the notion of man as the minia¬
ture of the surrounding order connected with the Greek term /aicpdc Koapoq most
probably appeared for the first time in Aristotle’s works, and philosophers before
that, including Plato, employed the analogy with no reference to the term (Conger
1922: xiv). In Islamic thought, the Greek term microcosm was replaced by the

35

Arabic term 'alam saghir. The term itself does not often occur in the texts of Is¬
lamic thinkers. However, different views based on the supposition of the analogy
between man and the macrocosm appear quite frequently.

In this study, I propose a division of microcosmism into explicit and implicit
forms. 34 By explicit microcosmism I refer to two different ways of using the idea.
The first is the most evident and the most easily recognizable form of the analogy,
meaning the contexts in which it is connected with the Arabic translation of the
term “microcosm”, 'alam saghir. The second obvious form of the analogy is the
comparison between man and the macrocosm which explicitly itemizes the corre¬
spondences between these two. Naturally comparing the microcosm with the mac¬
rocosm is an often occurring element of microcosmism, but I mean by this the
contexts in which these corresponding features are clearly listed and the analogy
between the two entities is in this way highlighted and made evident to the reader.
I will be referring to this second form of the explicit microcosm-macrocosm anal¬
ogy as explicit comparisons , 35

The microcosmic idea also appears in more obscure, less easily definable
formulations. Then the analogy may, for instance, stand as a background assump¬
tion in a philosophical theory (e.g., Platonic epistemology) or a scientific
worldview (e.g., astrology), and the author does not necessarily explicitly link it
with microcosmism nor itemize the corresponding features between the micro¬
cosm and the macrocosm. These forms of the analogy will be referred to as im¬
plicit microcosmism. Although, at least to my knowledge, one cannot find this
category in any previous classification, including these kinds of analogies in the
examination of the topic forms a part of all previous systematic studies. For ex¬
ample, most of the examples presented by Allers would fall under this category.

I find this twofold division necessary, not only in analysing different forms of
the idea, but also in restricting the corpus. In the texts, in which the analogy ap¬
pears in its explicit form, it also often occurs in implicit variations. Implicit use of
the idea does not, however, mean that it would necessarily appear in its explicit
form. A criterion in choosing texts for the core corpus of this study is that in all of
them the microcosm-macrocosm analogy also appears in its explicit form. Analys¬
ing the worldview of an author who refrains from any explicit microcosmic specu¬
lation through microcosmism might appear to be artificial and contrived. On the
other hand, in texts in which the analogy is explicitly present one should not ex-

34 . . . ...

We have together with Saana Svard used this division previously in our two articles treating

microcosmism in Islamic and Mesopotamian traditions; see Nokso-Koivisto and Svard 2013
and Svard and Nokso-Koivisto forthcoming 2014.

35 ... . .

As noted above, the role of the microcosm in this study is restricted to the human being.

Particularly in the Rasa ’it there are various comparisons between other levels of reality - the
heavenly spheres and the hereafter are, for instance, recurrently compared with a city. These
kinds of comparisons will not, however, be examined in this study.

36

pect the author to announce the idea at all occasions and the examination of the
implicit forms of the analogy may reveal essential meanings given to the idea.
Explicit and implicit forms of the analogy will not be examined separately, but
side by side according to their significance as part of the idea of man.

As was noted in the subsection on the history of microcosmism, the narrow
definition is also one of the deficiencies of studies of the analogy from a historical
perspective. The historical origins of the Islamic microcosm-macrocosm analogy
are not purely philosophical but are also mythological and religious. Hence, the
broad definition used in this study also applies to the definition of the analogy
when it comes to its historical background, and I aim to approach the topic from
all these perspectives.

My primary interest is in microcosmism that can be regarded as metaphysical
in contrast to the metaphorical analogy. This naturally requires interpretation from
the reader, because the distinction between metaphorical and metaphysical analo¬
gies is not always evident. Although in the Islamic tradition the idea of man as
a/the microcosm has been used as a mere figure of speech as well, in all of the
texts I have chosen for this study the analogy also seems to stand as a metaphysi¬
cal statement and part of the worldview of the author. 36 Exclusion of the purely
metaphorical use of the analogy has had an influence on the selection of the cor¬
pus: if I had given more weight to metaphorical microcosmism, the corpus would
have consisted of more “mainstream” philosophical texts as well and, for instance,
peripatetic philosophy would have been represented in it.

1.4.3 Three Perspectives on Microcosmism

Especially Allers’s system of classification will work as an essential conceptual
tool in this study. This helps in locating the Islamic tradition as part of the general
history of microcosmism. In addition to that, it is beneficial in solving problems in
restriction of the examination: it is not always easy to decide what to include un¬
der microcosmism and what not. Naturally Allers’s classification - like any other
division - gives no definite answer to all problematic questions and it has some
weaknesses from the perspective of the purposes of my study. There are some
aspects which I find important, missing or having only a minor role in Allers’s
division. For this, I propose a threefold division of the analogy especially suitable
for my purposes and my material. This division will be made according to the way
the microcosmic position of man is defined and includes, firstly, human-specific,
secondly, physiological and, thirdly, normative aspects of the idea. The structure

For this, I refrain from referring to the microcosmic idea as a "metaphor” which, for instance
in the case of explicit comparisons, is often done.

37

of this study will follow this division and the examination will be divided into
three chapters. As is the case with the previously presented classifications, this
division does not aim at being exhaustive: themes relevant from one perspective
appear in the context of another as well and the division of microcosmism into
these categories is not unambiguous.

1.4.3.1 Human-Specific Microcosmism

By human-specific microcosmism I refer to contexts in which man is thought to
form the microcosm as a representative of his species - not individually, but spe¬
cifically. This form of the analogy is in many ways connected with the cosmolog¬
ical position of the human being and the emphasis will be on the role of micro-
cosmic man among the created: how does the analogy define his relation to other
species and his position in the universe as a whole.

The specific approach is not mentioned separately in Allers’s or Barkan’s
classifications, but it appears in some other contexts. Izutsu (1983: 218-219), for
instance, states that Ibn ‘Arab! considers man to be the all-encompassing being
(i al-kawn al-jdmi') at the cosmic level, but does not consider an individual perfect
man to be a microcosm. Allers (1944: 357 n. 100), on the other hand, introduces
human-specific microcosmism as a possible solution for problems that the Neo¬
platonic system contains regarding the idea of man as the microcosm by stating
that “it is also possible to combine Neo-Platonic with microcosmistic views by
making not individual man, but man, or mankind, the microcosm”.

The third chapter of this study will consider microcosmism from this human-
specific dimension. Firstly, the topic will be approached scrutinizing explicit
comparisons between man and the universe. The notion of the world as a large
man along with anthropomorphic features found in the universe as a whole is pre¬
sent in the texts of many Islamic philosophers. Because of the focus of this study,
this indubitably important theme is approached only as it concerns the idea of man
and his position in the universe. In addition to examining the relationship between
the cosmological system and microcosmism, this subsection also works as an in¬
troduction to some cosmological views of the Ikhwan which will be relevant
throughout the study.

Human-specific microcosmism does not only concern the cosmological posi¬
tion of the human being in general, but also the origins and the ideal state of man.
The archetype of the human species is the second cosmological theme approached
in the third chapter. As will be seen, this is an essential topic concerning the
whole meaning given to the analogy in the Rasa 'il and its origins can be traced
back to earlier mythologies. Usually, in mythological forms of the idea, the first
man also functions as a model for the creation of the universe. This kind of idea
does not fit the Islamic context, but some philosophers, SuhrawardI in particular.

38

have revived elements of mythological traditions in their descriptions of the hu¬
man archetype. This raises a question concerning the motivation for microcos-
mism: in mythologies man’s role as the model in the creation formed an explana¬
tion for the correspondence between him and the surrounding reality. Did Islamic
philosophers develop their own explanation for the correspondence between the
microcosm and the macrocosm and, if so, what was it? I will examine this topic in
the case of the Ikhwan throughout the study.

Concerning the human being in the cosmos, an important theme is the inter¬
mediate position of man. Man as the middle being will be examined from the per¬
spective of the general twofold nature of man and, as part of an essential cosmo¬
logical topic in many texts, namely metaphor of light. The idea of man as the
middle being is connected with the idea of the human being bringing together the
characteristics of animals, which will be treated in its own subsection. In this con¬
text, the attitude of the texts towards animals and man’s role in the chain of being
will also be examined.

Although these forms of the analogy are most easily definable as human-
specific microcosmism, the topic will evidently appear in other chapters of the
study as well. Thus, one of my aims in this study is to consider, whether this kind
of category is possible to define and, if so, what is its relevance concerning the
corpus in general.

1.43.2 Physiological Microcosmism

A significant question when man is treated as the microcosm is what is meant by
man: is man approached as a corporeal or a spiritual being or as a psychophysical
whole he forms as the sum of them both? This topic is not separately notified in
Allers’s classification, which is due to the goal of his study: its aim is not to de¬
fine the idea of man like in the present study, but to examine the microcosm-
macrocosm analogy in general. Some studies, like that of Barkan, examine micro¬
cosmism from the perspective of the human body, which, as noted above, Barkan
refers to as literal microcosmism. In some studies, the primary attention is on the
spiritual aspect of man - in Barkan’s terms the figurative form of the analogy.
Some others emphasize the whole man forms, or, simply, the “individual’s life”,
as Barkan (1975: 63) describes Plato’s sociological comparisons.

In Islamic mediaeval thought, to treat the human body and the human soul as
their own separate entities is not something natural, and the treatment of the cor¬
poreal and the spiritual aspects of man rarely appear detached from each other.
Also when man is understood as the microcosm, the psychophysical holism is
often emphasized. Nevertheless, I find it convenient to scrutinize the human body
as the microcosm separately, because there are various passages especially inter¬
esting in this respect. Instead of employing Barkan’s above-mentioned terms, i.e.

39

the “literal” microcosmism of the analogies examining the human body and “fig¬
urative” referring to the analogies concentrating on the human soul, I will instead
refer to physiological and spiritual analogies. Although Barkan’s aim in using
these two terms was obviously different, in the context of this study “literal” and
“figurative” might be confused with the categories of metaphysical and metaphor¬
ical microcosmisms.

Physiological microcosmism will be the focus of the fourth chapter. The main
purpose will be to explore what the microcosm-macrocosm analogy in this form
discloses concerning the concept of corporeality and, on the other hand, how the
analogy is used in the description of human physiology.

The approach to man as a combination of the spiritual and the material is a
pervasive theme in whole microcosmism and as an opening to this chapter I will
consider the relationship between the body and the soul and the dichotomy be¬
tween them in the human being. Neoplatonism has quite a negative attitude to¬
wards the material aspect of man. As will be seen, in spite of being strongly Neo¬
platonic, some texts that employ the physiological microcosm-macrocosm analo¬
gy, such as Rasa 'il Ikhwan as-Safa ’, have a surprisingly positive attitude towards
the human body. I will examine, how the attitudes towards the human body are
expressed through the analogy.

An important aspect of microcosmism in its physiological form, are the ex¬
plicit comparisons between man and the surrounding reality. In these kinds of
comparisons, the analogy takes its most explicit forms and, at times, the physio¬
logical parallelism is expressed merely by itemizing the corresponding features or
structural similarities. These detailed listings can hardly be characterized as the
most serious philosophical speculation: as will be seen, in many cases these com¬
parisons were used for stylistic purposes in the texts. I will scrutinize the particu¬
lar features of these comparisons and examine their use in the descriptions of the
human being.

The meaning of physio logical microcosmism appears more evidently in scien¬
tific theories built on the analogy. Apart from the Ikhwan as-Safa’, physiological
comparisons are not widely employed, but as part of the scientific worldview the
analogy appears more frequently. All the exemplary fields share the notion of the
human body, or some aspect of it, as the microcosm. Through these scientific the¬
ories the technical aspect and practical value of the correspondence between man
and the surrounding reality will be explored. It will also be seen that the scientific
meaning given to the analogy is found to be amalgamated with the spiritual one.

1.4.3.3 Normative Microcosmism

In chapters three and four, the concentration will be on the human being as the
microcosm: first specifically and then physiologically, both of them usually refer-

40

ring to any human being as the microcosm. Hence, in many of its forms presented
above, the analogy between the microcosm and the macrocosm is considered to be
an existing fact - an actual characteristic of the human being. In the fifth chapter,
the idea will be examined as a possible feature of an individual man. The focus
will be on the normative or potential aspect of microcosmism. Then the analogy is
seen as something worth seeking and it concerns becoming a microcosm rather
than being one.

Brague (1997) examines microcosmism through the concept of imitation. For
him, a basic form of the analogy in the philosophy of Antiquity is its use as an
expression of an ideal - man should imitate the ideal order appearing in the mac¬
rocosm. Brague claims that in Islamic philosophy the term microcosm ceased to
be connected with imitation. The microcosm-macrocosm analogy as an expression
of an ideal continues to exist, for example, in the texts of al-FarabT, but the term
'alum saghTr is not used by him. On the other hand, Brague claims that the
Ikhwan as-Safa’ do employ the term, but separate it from imitation. If microcos¬
mism is understood in the extensive manner, as it is in this study, the imitation of
the surrounding reality and becoming a microcosm are, however, an essential fea¬
ture of most of the texts in this study, which I will indicate in the fifth chapter.

In this normative form, the focus is usually on spiritual microcosmism and the
microcosmic position concerns the human soul or the intellect. For this, in the
fifth chapter I will start with an examination of the meaning given to the spiritual
in man: what does it consist of and how is it related to the microcosmic idea? I
aim to explore this, scrutinizing the division of the human soul and its faculties
and the ways these faculties are treated in explicit comparisons. After that, the
analysis of the human faculties will continue with three examples: epistemological
comparisons used especially by the Ikhwan as-Safa’, al-Ghazall’s analogies which
concentrate on mastering the incentive faculties, and SuhrawardT’s story of the
development of a mystic.

In addition to explicit comparisons, epistemological views are in many ways
implicitly connected with microcosmism. The story of the wise king appearing in
the 26th epistle of Rasa 'il Ikhwan as-Safa ’ will work as a starting point of this
subsection and all three themes treated in it are somehow related to it. In this sub¬
section, one of my aims is to find out what is the role of the analogy in epistemo¬
logical theories of the texts. How is it employed in the descriptions of the process
of knowledge and how does it influence the Islamic theories of knowledge? If for
the Ikhwan as-Safa’ microcosmism is a tool to express the way to achieve episte¬
mological perfection, many Sufis have employed it in their descriptions of the
development of the human soul in a broader manner. As will be seen, in Sufi texts
a third level is attached to the analogy, and the correspondence not only concerns
the human being and the macrocosm but also God. The third level of the analogy

41

is also present when microcosmism is examined in the context of human activi¬
ties. Then the imitation of God becomes an essential aspect of the analogy.

In these three chapters I will analyse the theme employing the conceptual
tools presented above and examine how my threefold framework coheres with
Allers’s classification. I will provide some conclusions in individual subsections
during the study, but the concluding remarks of this work as a whole will be pre¬
sented at the end of the study. Before going to the three themes of microcosmism I
will first introduce the corpus of the study.

42

2. THE CORPUS

Rasd’il Ikhwan as-Safd’ will work as a starting point of this study. At the begin¬
ning of my doctoral studies, my intention was to provide a more general presenta¬
tion of the microcosm-macrocosm analogy in the Islamic tradition from the ninth
to the thirteenth centuries, and the Rasa 'il was intended to be only one of the texts
of the corpus. In the course of the study, the role of the Ikhwan in the develop¬
ment of the idea turned out to be more essential than I had expected and, for this, I
decided to take their microcosmism as the focus of the whole investigation. Thus,
I will concentrate on the ways the Ikhwan elaborate the analogy, and then extend
the examination to the Islamic tradition more generally. My aim is not to provide
an exhaustive study of the theme - that is not feasible in a single thesis. Instead, I
propose some general frames for the development of the microcosmic idea in Is¬
lamic thought, evaluating its appearance in the Rasa 'il and in certain other texts.

Another goal of this study is to examine the position of the Ikhwan in the Is¬
lamic tradition, namely the influences they received from earlier tradition and
their impact on later texts - to the extent this is possible within the frame of my
material. For this, in addition to the Rasa 'il I focus on the texts which, on the one
hand, employ the microcosm-macrocosm analogy and, on the other, are acknowl¬
edged to be somehow, directly or indirectly, related to the Rasa ’il.

In this chapter, I offer a general overview of the texts in focus and illuminate
how they are, according to previous studies, related to the Rasa 'il. Before pro¬
ceeding to individual thinkers, I will clarify an essential terminological matter
connected to the corpus.

2.1 ON TERMINOLOGY: “ISLAMIC THOUGHT”

Two terms which define the whole corpus of this study are “Islamic” and
“thought”. Should the tradition approached in this study, be called “Islamic”, “Ar¬
abic”, or by some other term, such as “Islamicate”? 37 This kind of terminology
always has its weaknesses, but I consider problems with the term “Islamic” less
serious than those of the other options.

Disagreement between the terms “Arabic” and “Islamic” appears, for exam¬
ple, in the study of history of philosophy. It has been thought that, as Dimitri Gu-
tas (2002: 17-18) affirms:

“Islamicate” is a term Hodgson (1974: 57-60) presents as a counterpart for the term
“occidental”, but the term never really won great popularity.

43

Arabic was the language of Islamic civilization and the vehicle in which the identity
and self-consciousness of that culture was cultivated and transmitted to all citizens in
the Islamic world, regardless of their religion. [...] Even in the cases where some late
philosophical works were written in Persian, the terminology was still completely Ara¬
bic as was the way of thinking that underlay the expression.

Certainly, the position of Arabic language was strong in the mediaeval Islamic
world, but the authors writing in Persian would probably disagree on Gutas’s idea
of Arabic as their way of thinking. Many of the authors in the Islamic world did
write, think and argue in Persian or other languages, and in some areas and peri¬
ods these languages were in no way subordinate to Arabic. Regarding this study,
although my corpus is constituted primarily of texts written in Arabic, some Per¬
sian texts are included as well. SuhrawardI seems like a good example of an au¬
thor, who, even though he wrote in Arabic as well, cannot be regarded as an “Ar¬
abic thinker”.

Peter Adamson and Richard C. Taylor (2005: 3) emphasize the historical per¬
spective in the use of the term “Arabic philosophy”. They justify its use with ref¬
erence to the fact that the tradition started with the translation of Greek philosoph¬
ical texts into Arabic and later philosophers of the tradition were interested in
“coming to grips with texts made available in the translation movement, rather
than with putting forward a properly ‘Islamic’ philosophy”. Without undervaluing
the importance of the translation movement, Arabic philosophy could be consid¬
ered, as Oliver Leaman (1996: 1) points out, to be only one, albeit important,
strand of Islamic philosophy. I agree with Leaman in that “whatever is meant by
Arabic philosophy cannot hope to be comprehensive enough to encompass the
whole of Islamic philosophy”.

There are two main problems that have been indicated in the term “Islamic
philosophy”: firstly, that the use of the term implies ignorance of the non-Muslim
philosophers in the Islamic world and, secondly, that it overemphasizes the ties
between philosophy and religion.

In this study, I understand “Islamic” as a cultural restriction. In the present-
day situation this would be more problematic, but in the political situation of the
Middle Ages, at least until the thirteenth century (when all of the texts of the cor¬
pus of this study were completed), there was a region that could - despite its geo¬
graphical, ethnical, linguistic and religious heterogeneity - be referred to as the
“Islamic world”. This “Islamic world” consisted of the areas which were under
the governance of different Muslim riders. Hence, by “Islamic culture” I do not
refer to any monolithic area or culture, but to an umbrella notion under which
many local varieties existed.

Thus, although all of the texts that are discussed in this study were written by
Muslims, this is not the reason why the term “Islamic thought” is used. There
were other philosophers writing in the area of the Islamic world, who were, for

44

example, Jewish or Christian. However, when the term “Islamic philosophy” is
understood as it is in this study, their work, too, falls under the term “Islamic
thought”.

There still remains the problem raised especially in the discussion on Orien¬
talism which sees religion as a defining feature of the culture and in this way
“religionizing” it and, in the case of this study, the scientific and philosophical
tradition. 3S This has been seen as a typical feature of the approach to “Eastern cul¬
tures” - even if “Christendom” has been used of mediaeval Europe, “European
culture” is quite rarely referred to as “Christian culture”. So, why should this be
the case with areas ruled by Muslims? It is also to be noted that even if the medi¬
aeval intellectual tradition is in many ways more religious than modern philoso¬
phy, not all of the topics treated in it are religious and surely do not follow the
principles set by religious scholars of their times. Not many of the views present¬
ed in the texts would receive the affirmation of an “average Muslim”. I admit
these problems, but, however, defend the term “Islamic” given the lack of better
candidates. Any geographical restriction does not really serve my purposes and I
find such terms as Marshall Hodgson’s “Islamicate” artificial.

Lastly, one note concerning the term “thought”. Instead of using the word
“philosophy”, I refer to the traditions treated in this study as “thought”. My inten¬
tion is not to evaluate the philosophical value of the works or the argumentation
skills of the authors, but to avoid problems faced in bringing together this collec¬
tion of works which do not evidently fall into any one part of philosophy. The
Ikhwan obviously were philosophers, but how should works attributed to Tahir ibn
Hayyan or al-QazwInl’s Aja 'ib al-makhluqat be regarded? Neither the corpus nor
the topic in focus here requires restriction to the field of philosophy. The concept
of microcosm is not, as I define it, solely a philosophical notion, but also has, for
instance, mythological aspects.

2.2 RASA IL IKHWAN AS-SAFA

Despite more than a century and a half of academic research on Rasa 'il Ikhwan
as-Safd ’ wa khulldn al-wafd ’ {Epistles of the Brethren of Purity and the Friends
of Loyalty, in the following referred to as the Rasd’il), there is still no agreement
either on its dating, on the identification of the authors, on the ideologies they
represent or on the original form of the text. In the following pages, I will provide
a brief overview of the most important arguments concerning these topics.

On the islamization of the Middle Eastern history and culture, see Zubaida 2011, and on the
problems of Orientalism in the context of the history of philosophy, see Gutas (2002: 8-16).

45

2.2.1 Dating of the Work

It is mentioned in the Rasd’il that the text was composed by the Ikhwan as-Sala’,
the Brethren of Purity. The authors usually refer to themselves in the plural, but
occasionally the singular is used. Abbas Hamdani (1983: 458) explains this by
pointing to the process of writing: the authors worked as a group with one respon¬
sible coordinator. Sometimes the whole myth of the brethren has been questioned.
Samuel Miklos Stern (1964: 420-421) claims that the obscure group described in
the text does not even refer to the authors themselves. According to him, the mys¬
terious Ikhwan are a portrayal of an ideal community rather than a description of
an existing group. Yves Marquet (1986b: 1071), on the other hand, assumes that
the term Ikhwan as-Safa’ alludes, in addition to the authors, to all the initiates of
the doctrine versed in the Rasa 'il.

Different estimates place the composition of the Rasa 'il between the end of
the ninth and the beginning of the 11th century. Marquet (1986a: 40) belongs to
the supporters of the late completion of the composition project. He mentions that
there are notable differences between individual epistles and it seems likely that
the writing process was accomplished over a long period of time: the compilation
of the work seems to have been initiated as early as during the last decades of the
ninth century and, according to Marquet, the Rasa 'il had its final form possibly
around the year 960, but not in any case later than 980. In some recent studies, the
composition is considered to be an even longer process from the 840’s to the
980’s (Baffioni 2008a: 102).

Although there are scholars who date the work to as late as to the mid-11th
century (Casanova 1915), references to the work are, according to A. L. Tibawi
(1955: 35-36), so abundant in the last decades of the tenth century that it must
have been completed by that time. Lately, however, evidence of the existence of
the Rasd’il’s final form decades before Marquet’s estimate has been obtained. As
de Callatay (2013: 301) summarizes, “Hoy en dia se puede considerar que existe
un consenso casi universal entre los expertos sobre los Ijwan al-Safa’ en decir que
los anos 960-980 solo marcan una especie de terminus ad quem de ese proceso de
composicion, y que su terminus post quem debe ser buscado mucho antes.” His
own study comparing magic in the Rasd'il with that in Rutbat al-haldm and
Ghdyat al-haklm supports the view previously presented by Maribel Fierro (1996)
that the latter texts were completed by the mid-tenth century, and because the
Rasa 'il was a source for these works, it must have circulated in its approximately
final form in the Iberian Peninsula before that (de Callatay 2013).

Hamdani presents quite radical views on the topic. He considers the work a
composition of a group of pre-Fatimid Isma'llls in a short period of time before
the end of the first decade of the tenth century. He justifies his theory using both
internal and external evidence. The former is connected with the religious convic-

46

tions of the authors. Hamdani (1983) indicates passages from the work which,
according to him, affirm that the authors were IsmaTlIs, whose intention was to
establish a state following their ideals. From their criticism towards other Shi'I
sects, Flamdani comes to the conclusion that they must have composed the work
after the concealment of the last Twelver Imam in 873, but before the establish¬
ment of the Fatimid state in 909. As for external evidence, Flamdani (1999: 76-
78) argues that citations of the Rasa 'il in other sources, such as in a work of the
poet Ibn ar-Ruml (d. 896), support the early dating of the work. 39 Fie also claims
to refute certain previous theories, which affirm the late dating of the work based
on citations appearing in it, by indicating many of them to be later interpolations.
Fie emphasizes that the printed editions used by most scholars are unreliable in
this respect and there are huge differences between the manuscripts when it comes
to quotations (see n. 131). (Flamdani 2008: 92-98)

2.2.2 Identification of the Authors

Regardless of the disagreement concerning the date of the Ikhwan, there seems to
be a consensus that the Rasa 'il was for the most part written in the city of Basra
(and, partly, according to some, e.g., el-Bizri 2006: 11, in Baghdad). The precise
identity of the authors has been discussed since the Middle Ages. Sometimes the
work has been attributed to only one person, like in the fictional but widespread
version of its history - supported, as Tibawi (1955: 29) points out, by some West¬
ern scholars in the 19th century - in which the work is considered a composition
of the enigmatic al-Majrltl known as the author of Ghayat al-hakun. 40

Friedrich Dieterici 41 (1876: 141-142) was the first to bring up the list of four
names of authors connected with the Isma'IlI movement given by Abu Hayyan at-
TawhldT (d. 1023) in his al-Imtd' wa ’l-mu anasa: Abu Sulayman Muhammad ibn
Ma'shar al-Bustl (also known as al-MaqdisT), AbiiT-Hasan All ibn Harun az-
Zanjanl, Abu Ahmad an-Nahrajurl and al-'Awfi. This assembly of sages is said to
have worked during the 980’s in Basra. Stern (1964) continued the discussion
revealing another list from at-Tawhldl’s contemporary 'Abd al-Jabbar al-
FlamadanT. Fie mentions as authors of the Rasa 'il three of the same names, replac¬
ing al-MaqdisI with Abu Muhammad ibn Abf 1-Baghl. Fie also indicates that they
represented a marginal branch of Isma'Ilism and their views concerning the order

Louis Massignon (1913: 324) uses the appearance of the quotations of this very same poet in
the Rasa 'it as a piece of evidence for his claims that the Rasa 'it cannot have been composed
prior to the beginning of the 10th century.

This, however, is an outdated theory, see 2.3.5.

Dieterici was the first remarkable figure in the study of the Rasa’it. He did huge work
researching the text and translating parts of it into German during the second half of the 19th
century. For more on early research on the Rasa ’il, see Tibawi 1955.

47

of the Brethren were more of a utopia than concrete political ideals. The authen¬
ticity of these listings is questioned by scholars dating the text to earlier decades.

The main discussion in Ikhwan research has concentrated on defining the rela¬
tion of the authors with IsmaTlism - this was the major theme in research on the
text for throughout the 20th century. As already noted, Hamdani (1983) and Stern
(1964) consider the Isma Tlism of the Ikhwan to be a proven fact, albeit their
views concerning the placement of the Ikhwan within the movement vary. Mar-
quet has published a dissertation and dozens of articles on the thought of the
Ikhwan which he interprets through Isma'IlI concepts. According to him, “it
seems indisputable that the Epistles represent the state of Isma'IlI doctrine at the
time of their composition” (Marquet 1986b: 1071). 42 The influence of the Rasd'il
on later Isma'IlI and especially TayyibI circles is generally acknowledged, 4 ' but
many scholars argue against the Isma'IlI origin of the work. Among the features
conflicting with Isma'IlI thought is, for example, its attitude towards the Imam
(see, e.g., Tibawi 1955: 34). Some take a more cautious position in this discussion
and de Callatay (2005b: xi) instincts the reader of the work to give up prejudices
about its pure Isma'IlI nature. According to him, “so restrictive a definition is in
itself incompatible with the very eclecticism shown by the Brethren throughout
their work.” 44

Another branch of thought into which the Ikhwan have attached to is Sufism.
The mystical dimension of the text and the Ikhwan’s impact on later Sufism is
accentuated by Susanne Diwald (1979: 11-24). Mariana Khoury-Samani (1993—
1994) also explores the relationship of the Rasd'il with Sufis and, although she
does not claim that the authors were necessarily Sufis as such, she indicates some
obvious Sufi features in, for instance, their vocabulary, views concerning the puri¬
fication of the soul and attitudes towards ascetism. She also points out similarities
between the views of the Ikhwan and the 7th century Nestorian Isaac of Nineveh,
who is known for his Sufi-like views (Khoury-Samani 1993-1994: 18-19).
Baffioni (2000a), on the other hand, rejects the link between the Ikhwan and mys¬
tics and considers their religious views to be very far from mystical or ascetic in¬
terpretations of Islam. She also claims that the term “friends of God” (awliya ’

The IsmaTlism of the Ikhwan is examined throughout the production of Marquet, but
especially in Marquet 1985.

On the Ikhwan’s relations with TayyibI IsmaTlism, see al-Hamdanl 1932.

Khoury-Samani (1993-1994: 318) also finds attempts to strictly define the branch of Islam
of the Ikhwan problematic, and concludes “...au lieu de vouloir rattacher les Ikhwan a un
madhhab , pourquoi ne pas envisager le probleme d’une maniere differente et faire de leur
doctrine un madhhab qui leur est propre. Nous pensons en effet que VEncyclopedic est un
traite qui expose et explicite une certaine voie qui menera Tame au salut, voie qui est
constitute d’elements disparates que les Ikhwan, apres les avoir selectionnes, ont empruntes
a diverses doctrines et religions.”

48

Allah), which often appears in the work, has nothing to do with the same term
used by Sufis.

A very different view from all the other scholars is the one represented by
Adel Awa (1948), who proposes that the Ikhwan were closely related to the
Mu tazila. This view is rejected among others by Marquet (1986b: 1071), who
finds it contradictious with the apparent hostility the Ikhwan express towards the
mutakallimun in general.

2.2.3 Philosophy of the Ikhwan

On account of its form, the Rasa 'il has been treated as an encyclopaedia. Geert
Jan van Gelder (1997: 256) notes that in the mediaeval Islamic world there were
few encyclopaedias bringing together all fields of knowledge, the Rasa 'il being
among the best known and the most extensive ones. 45 Because of this encyclopae-
dism and the style of the Rasa 'il, some scholars have emphasized the popular na¬
ture of the work. El-Bizri (2006: 11-12) points out that the philosophy of the
Ikhwan and especially their microcosm-macrocosm analogy should be treated as
“a populist assimilation of the Graeco-Arabic classical sciences within the tenth
century urban /o//(-beliefs of the learned of Iraq”. According to him, “syncretism
of Ikhwan al-Safa’ may have been a genuine expression of the diversity that char¬
acterized the variegated urban cultures of the Fertile Crescent of Syria.” 46

In spite of the encyclopaedic structure of the Rasa 'il, the main purpose of the
work seems to be transmission of an eclectic philosophy. The philosophical sys¬
tem forms a synthesis of, on the one hand. Neoplatonism, Aristotelianism and
some philosophical traditions outside the mainstream of philosophy, such as Her¬
metic and Neopythagorean thought, and, on the other hand, religious - Christian
and most importantly Islamic - traditions. Ian Richard Netton has laid emphasis
on this strongly eclectic nature of the work. He describes the authors as “Wisdom
Muslims” and stresses two important aspects amalgamated in the text: orthodox
Islamic thought and Greek philosophy (Netton 1979: 65-67).

Most scholars admit the eclectic nature of the work but opinions concerning
the sources of this eclecticism vary. Marquet (1966) has found the Sabians of
Harran to be an important background influence for the Ikhwan. According to him
(1986b: 1075-1076), in the Rasa’il early IsmaTlism was amalgamated with Sabi-
an thought and it took a strongly Neoplatonic form. It is because of this, in his
opinion, that there are traces of the influence of early Babylonian astrology at¬
tached to the Indian, Iranian and Greek astrological elements, the Hebrew Bible,

In his concise description of the work van Gelder (1997: 255) also mentions the “obsession”
of the Ikhwan with numbers as well as with “the interrelationship of everything with
everything else in the cosmos: man as a microcosm, the universe as a macroanthrope”.

Baffioni (2008a: 103) criticizes the defining of the work as “popular”.

49

the Hermetic tradition, the Pythagoreans, Aristotle, Plato and the Neoplatonists,
Ptolemy, Euclid and Nichomachus in the work. In Marquet’s opinion, this unique
kind of eclecticism is a key characteristic of the thought of the Ikhwan: “What
seems most remarkable, however, is the synthesis that they achieved, in an origi¬
nal manner, for then metaphysics, adapting them to the dogmas of Islam, and
modifying, where necessary, the information of their predecessors” (1076).

The way in which the Rasd’il brings together philosophical and religious
sources has been admired by many. Carmela Baffioni (2008a: 122) accentuates
the consistency in which the Ikhwan bring together philosophy and religion:
“Their reworking of the “foreign” heritage, which was also accurately reproduced
in terms of philology, was anything but inconsistent. In the ninth and tenth centu¬
ries their opus represented the only way of supporting the notion of a dual source
of knowledge, based on revelation and reason.” In the sphere of Greek philoso¬
phy, Baffioni (2008a: 104) estimates the Platonic influence to be scarce in the
work, appearing especially in the context of theological knowledge, while Aristo¬
telian and Stoic ideas dominate when the scientific side of knowledge is ap¬
proached. Regarding Neoplatonism in the Rasd'il, Baffioni (2008a: 113) says that
“the Ikhwan’s interpretation of Neoplatonism, merged with neopythagoreanism,
can be taken as then own philosophy rather than merely an outside source or in¬
fluence.” Baffioni (2008a: 114) also indicates similarities between the Neoplato¬
nism of the Ikhwan and such Isma 'IlI authors as as-Sijistanl and an-Nasafi. In the
same context, she states that the philosophy of the Rasd ’il was developed further
by Hamid ad-DIn al-Kirmanl.

2.2.4 The Rasa 'il and Microcosmism

The Rasa 'il is divided into four parts, proceeding from concrete sciences towards
abstract ones. The parts are again subdivided into epistles. The number of the
epistles and their original arrangement are debated questions. There is a contradic¬
tion in the number of the epistles even in the work itself; various passages of the
Rasd’il refer to 51 epistles. The most important contemporary editions, however,
divide the work into 52 epistles. Especially the authenticity of the last epistle on
magic has been under discussion and it has been suggested that it could be partly a
later interpolation. 47 In the text itself there are references to changes in the ar¬
rangement of the epistles at least as regards the eighth and ninth epistles and the
last two epistles. 4S

See deCallatay 2011: 5-10

For discussion on the arrangement and number of the epistles, see Tibawi 1955: 38-39 and
Hamdani 2008: 85-92.

50

In addition to these 52 epistles, there is the comprehensive epistle, ar-Risdla
al-jami 'a, which forms its own independent work of approximately a quarter of
the size of the Rasa 'il and claims to conclude the work. 49 More than that, howev¬
er, it discusses the implicit meaning of the preceding epistles and it was “a work
for separate distribution among a special elite” (Hamdani 2008: 90). Because of
this rather esoteric nature of ar-Risdla al-jami 'a, on the one hand, and because of
the abundance of microcosmic material already in the 52 epistles on the other, I
have decided to exclude ar-Risdla al-jami 'a from my investigation and concen¬
trate only on the 52 epistles. This does not, however, mean that the microcosm-
macrocosm analogy would not be highly relevant also in ar-Risdla al-jami ' a , and
further study of the topic would be worthwhile.

In this study, I will mainly use Butrus al-Bustanl’s (1983) edition and I will
abbreviate it as “R”. Some epistles have already been edited in the ongoing project
of the Institute of Ismaili Studies. 50 When I have had access to these new editions,
I have abbreviated them in the following way: Wright’s edition of the fifth epistle
as “If”, Baffioni’s edition of the 10th—14th epistles as “B”, Goodman’s and
McGregor’s edition of the 22nd epistle as “G” and de Callatay’s and Halflants’
edition of the first part of the 52nd epistle as “C”.

I started the examination of Islamic microcosmism in my MA thesis (Maukola
2008), in which I studied the multiple aspects of the idea in the Rasd’i /. 51 As I
found out in my study, it receives various formulations and is an essential feature
of the whole philosophy of the Ikhwan. The importance of the idea in the work
has been widely acknowledged and Alessandro Bausani (1978: 12) mentions it as
the filo rosso in the whole encyclopaedia. The position of the Ikhwan in the elabo¬
ration of microcosmism in the history of philosophy has also been acknowledged
by many. According to Conger (1922: 50):

In spite of its naive and fantastic views, one may say that it is in the Encyclopaedia of
the Brethren of Sincerity that the theory that man is a microcosm first becomes impos¬
ing. It is no longer fragmentary, but fundamental; and it is no longer isolated, but
linked up with a comprehensive and correlated world-system.

The Ikhwan dedicate two of the 52 epistles to the treatment of the microcosm-
macrocosm analogy, one in the second volume, which discusses the natural sci¬
ences, the 26th epistle On the Saying of the Wise That the Human Being is a Mi-

Conceming the authenticity of ar-Risala al-jami 'a, see, e.g., de Callatay 2013: 304-306.

The study of the Ikhwan has advanced greatly in recent years thanks to the work of the
Institute of Ismaili Studies. The critical edition and English translation of the whole Rasa ’it
is scheduled to be finished in the near future through the co-operation of the IIS and Oxford
University Press.

I have summarized the main findings of the thesis in my article Maukola 2009.

51

crocosm, and the other in the third part on psychology, the 34th epistle On the
Saying of the Wise that the World is a Large Man. While in the latter the Ikhwan
utilize the idea mainly for the purpose of describing the ontological structure of
the world, in the 26th epistle the main concern is on man and his faculties. In
these epistles, the correspondence appears at various levels at the same time: the
author jumps from one theme to another in the middle of a subsection - from the
elements of the human body to the astrological level or from heavens to the sub¬
lunar sphere. This is one of the reasons I find it necessary to approach the topic
systematically and with an aim to define its different forms in the work. Apart
from these two epistles, the analogy occurs frequently everywhere in the Rasa 'il,
and it seems clear that for the Ikhwan the microcosmic idea is not restricted to the
fields of the natural sciences and psychology, but also has a theological, as well as
- to some extent - a mathematical dimension.

In the table below I have gathered all the explicit and otherwise obvious ap¬
pearances of microcosmism in each epistle. The first column “Term microcosm”
refers to the appearances of the Arabic term 'alam saghTr excluding the contexts
in which it is used to refer to the 26th epistle. 52 The second column presents the
occurrences of explicit comparisons as defined in 1.4.2. The third column indi¬
cates brief references to these kinds of comparisons, which do not take the form of
long listings between the corresponding features. These may simply occur in men¬
tions such as “the brain is in the human body like a king in his kingdom” without
going into details of the analogy. Into these “references to comparisons” I have
also included contexts which by means of a short analogy define the relationship
between the human body and the human soul (like the saying that the body is to
the soul what a ship is to the sailor). The fourth column brings together appear¬
ances of the idea of man as the middle being as defined in Chapter 3. By “Other
reference” I mean the occurrences of the analogy which do not fall into any of the
aforementioned classes, but express the analogy between man and the macrocosm
clearly and without requiring interpretation, claiming, for instance, that man in¬
cludes everything in the created world.

As will be seen later in this study, many implicit forms of the analogy are ex¬
cluded from this table and it certainly does not intend to give a comprehensive
picture of the use of microcosmism in the Rasa 'il. For instance, astrological theo¬
ry and many epistemological ideas are treated as forms of the analogy, but are not

I have not included in the table the occurrences of the tenn at- ‘alam al-asghar appearing
several times in the 52nd epistle (R IV: 444, 446, 447, 456 x 5, 457 x 4 and 472). It seems to
be mostly used synonymously with alam saghtr although in some cases it is not completely
clear whether it refers to the human being or to the World of Generation and Corruption. It is
interesting, though, that this term, used also in the Jdbirian Corpus (see 3.1.1), occurs in the
Rasd'il only in this last epistle - and only in the latter part of it - whose authenticity is
disputed. On the short and long versions of the epistle on magic, see de Callatay 2011: 5-10.

52

presented in the table. Nonetheless, as can be seen, even by indicating only these
evident and indisputable occurrences of the analogy, it can be shown that micro-
cosmism is a theme which is often employed by the Ikhwan and we can actually
find only seventeen epistles with no reference to these forms of the analogy at all.

53

References to Microcosmism in the Rasa’il

Epistle

1. Term microcosm

2. Explicit
comparison

3. Reference to
comparison

4. Man as the middle
being

5. Other
reference

Part 1

1

2

3

4

5

W: 97-99,150-162,129-
132

W: 137

6

7

R1:259

8

R1:287

9

R I: 316,319-320,327-328

R1:297-298,306

RI: 297-298, 306

10

B: 27

B: 10

11

12

13

14

Part 2

15

16

R U: 25,49

17

R11: 59

18

19

RII: 88

20

RII: 143-147

21

RII: 158

22

G: 18-20

G: 137

G: 4,278

23

RII: 378

passim

passim

R II: 379-380 et passim

passim

24

RII: 396

R II: 415

25

RII: 423,429-430

26

R II: 456,457,462,475

passim

passim

R II: 457,474-475 et passim

passim

27

R III: 5

R III: 5-7

28

RIII: 31,20-22

29

R III: 39,44,45,46

RIII: 34

30

R III: 75-76

31

R III: 124-125,144-145

RIII: 104,131

Part 3

32

R III: 188

R III: 188

33

34

R III: 212

passim

passim

R III: 225-230 et passim

passim

35

R UI: 241-242,243

36

37

38

RIII: 294,295,314

R III: 298

39

R III: 333

RIII: 328

R UI: 333

40

R UI: 380-383

RIII: 369

41

Part 4

42

RIII: 505

RIII: 426-427,486,496

RIII: 426-427

43

RIII: 12

44

45

46

RIV: 83,105-123,116

47

R IV: 125

48

RIV: 171-173

RIV: 169,182,187

RIV: 169

49

RIV: 213x2,219,229,

235

RIV: 214-223,231-234,
234-235

RIV: 213,229

R IV:208-209

50

RIV: 256-257

51

52

RIV: 367x2,414

RIV: 415

RIV: 339, 355-357, 367,414-
415,427

R IV: 380

54

2.3 OTHER TEXTS

The primary attention of this study will be on the Rasa ’il and my aim is to provide
a systematic picture of the use of microcosmism particularly in the thought the
Ikhwan express in their 52 epistles. In order to define the specific features of their
microcosm-macrocosm analogy on the one hand, and to examine their role in the
general development of it in Islamic thought, on the other, I have chosen some
other thinkers and works, whose contributions to the idea will be examined side
by side with the Rasa ’il. In the case of the other texts, however, my purpose is not
to examine the topic in as comprehensive a manner as in the Rasd’il. Hence, I
have included in the examination only some particular works or even parts or
chapters of works, which are relevant from the perspective of microcosmism. As
pointed out (see 1.4.2), in all of these texts, the analogy appears in its explicit and
metaphysical forms.

As was seen previously, the thought of the Ikhwan forms a synthesis of a wide
range of earlier philosophical and religious thought. This eclecticism is character¬
istic also for their microcosmic speculation. I will study how Islamic thinkers
combined different traditions in their microcosmism. I am interested in to what
extent the analogy worked as a point of contact for different philosophical and
religious traditions in the mediaeval Middle East. The Rasa ’il is in various ways
related to many different branches of Islamic thought, among the most often men¬
tioned ones being IsmaTlI thought, the Hermetic tradition and Sufism. In addition,
on account of its form, the Rasa ’il is obviously a part of the encyclopaedic tradi¬
tion. I have included in the corpus texts pertaining to the Hermetic tradition, the
history of science, Sufism and the encyclopaedic tradition.

This selection of texts is clearly not the only possible one and I have had to
make some omissions. As mentioned previously, the IsmaTlI connections of the
Ikhwan have been an important topic in earlier research and, for this reason, the
exclusion of this tradition from my examination requires a special note. As for the
present study, I have laid emphasis on other intellectual branches related to the
Rasd’il and, even if some of the authors included in the study (e.g., TusI and the
authors of the Jabirian texts) have been connected with IsmaTlism, I have not in¬
cluded in my corpus any of the texts pertaining to the core of IsmaTlI thought.
Extending the examination to the IsmaTlI tradition more profoundly would cer¬
tainly provide important additional aspects to the topic, but would require its own
separate study. 53 Another omission from this study, which would be relevant in

As has kindly been suggested to me by Daniel De Smet, especially Abu Ya'qub as-Sijistanl’s
production would be relevant from this perspective, and, concerning the influence of the
Ikhwan, TayyibI literature would provide an interesting viewpoint as well. As Daftary (2007:

55

tracing the influence of the Ikhwan in later microcosmism, consists of various
mediaeval Jewish authors working in Islamic areas (see, e.g., Zonta 2011). This,
however, would also require a separate study.

2.3.1 Sirr al-khaliqa

Kitdb sirr al-khaliqa wa-san 'at at-tabi'a (The Book of the Secret of the Creation
and the Art of Nature, also known as Kitdb fi l- 'Hal (A Book on Reasons) in the
following referred to as the Sirr) is a work with at least as obscure a history as that
of the Rasa il. The work is attributed to Apollonius of Tyana, usually referred to
in Arabic as Ballnus (or Ballnas, some other forms are used as well, e.g., Abliis in
Ghdyat al-hakim), who is supposed to have lived during the first century AD. 54
There are altogether eight Arabic works preserved in Hill or partly in quotations
which are attributed to Apollonius of Tyana. 55 Apollonius is one of the main fig¬
ures in the Hermetic tradition and - although Apollonius’s role as the author of
the work is generally denied - Sirr al-khaliqa has been considered to be among
the Arabic Hermetic texts. Hermes is treated as an important authority in the work
(e.g., Sirr 524, VI 33.2) and the worldview presented in it follows ideas which
are often regarded as Hermetic. This kind of definition of the Hermetic tradition is
not undisputed and, in current research, for instance, Kevin van Bladel does not
include the text under his definition of Arabic Hermetica. 56

The real author of the Sirr is still unknown. Most scholars affirm that the
work was written during the Islamic era and usually its compilation is dated
somewhere between the seventh and the ninth centuries (see Weisser 1980: 8-10).
Some remarkable findings concerning the Sirr were made by Paul Kraus (1942:
275), who, for instance, says that the work was written at the beginning of the
ninth century, during the reign ofal-Ma’mun. He also indicates the huge influence
of the Sirr on the Jdbirian Corpus : there are various references to the Sirr in Jabi-
rian texts and several works pertaining to the Jdbirian Corpus are entitled ‘“ala

234) affirms, the idea is also present in later Isma lli cosmology and appears, for instance, in
al-Kirmanl’s system. I hope I will be able to extend my examination in that direction in my
future studies.

In the Islamic tradition there are two persons named Apollonius, Apollonius of Tyana and
the mathematician Apollonius of Perga (ca. 200 BC), see Plessner 1986: 994-995.

As Plessner (1986: 995) points out, al-QazwInl in his Aja’ib al-makhluqdt several times
quotes a work called Kitdb al-khawass, which is considered to be one of Balinus’s works.

On van Bladel’s strict definition, see note 11. In fact, according to some looser definitions of
Hermeticism, many of the texts in the present study could be regarded as Hermetic or at least
as somehow related to that tradition. Peters (1990: 189), for instance, sees the way to
attribute works to some legendary figures as a characteristic feature of the Islamic Hermetic
tradition and names as examples of this Jabir ibn Hayyan, al-Majritl and the Ikhwan as-Safa’.

56

ra’y Ballnas”. (Kraus 1942: 280-290) The Sirr was first partly edited by Silvestre
de Sacy and later by Julius Ruska. Ruska was also the first to treat the well-known
alchemical Tabula Smaragdina as the final part of the Sirr. A critical edition of
the whole work including the Tabula Smaragdina as well as the most extensive
research has been carried out by Ursula Weisser. She also points out some possi¬
ble influences of the Sirr on the Rasa 'il, noting similarities, for instance, in their
views concerning astrological embryology (Weisser 1980: 230).

Similar to the Greek tradition (see 1.2.2), microcosmism in the Islamic con¬
text has been connected with the Hermetic tradition. Marquet (1975: 243-244)
defines some explicit forms of the physiological microcosmic idea as a distinc¬
tively Hermetic feature of the thought in the Rasa il. Whether the Sirr is defined
as Hermetic or not, microcosmism is undoubtedly an essential feature of the work.
The Sirr has been divided into six chapters, the Tabula Smaragdina as an inde¬
pendent work following them. The work is characterized as an “alchemical cos¬
mology” and it proceeds from the general description of the universe and its crea¬
tion to the different classes of beings which inhabit it. The third chapter is dedi¬
cated to minerals, the fourth to plants, the fifth to animals and the sixth to the hu¬
man being. Microcosmic references appear in different parts of the work, but, be¬
cause my main interest is in the idea of man, the last chapter of the Sirr will be in
focus in my study.

2 . 3.2 The Jabirian Corpus

One aspect of microcosmism is its relationship with scientific tradition, especially
alchemy and astrology. As an example of these scientific disciplines, I have cho¬
sen to study the Jabirian Corpus. Marquet (1986a) examines the relationship be¬
tween the texts attributed to Jabir and the Rasa 'il and notes that both were com¬
posed in approximately the same period and in the same geographical area. The
language of the texts also joins the two together, although, as Marquet points out,
the language is at times more elegant in the Jabirian texts. Marquet also considers
that the religious views of the authors are similar. 57 Later he goes even further
than this to argue that there are some passages in the Rasa 'il which might indicate

Marquet (1986a: 41—43) points out, however, some philosophical, mostly cosmological,
differences between the texts. He argues that the Ikliwan are in their cosmological views
more Plotinian and closer to al-Farabl than Jabirian views. The views presented in the
Jabirian Corpus, on the other hand, are inspired by those of Sirr al-khaliqa. He, however,
finds a meeting point between the texts, namely the Hermetic tradition: “Il y a cependant un
point commun, c’est l’«hennetisme», au sens propre (c’est-a-dire Tinfluence du soi-disant
Hermes Trismegiste) et au sens figure, c’est-a-dire l’esoterisme, qui exige la dispersion des
idees exprimees dans un ouvrage, en alchimie comme dans le domaine philosophique
d’ailleurs” (43).

57

that some of the authors participated in the writing of both of these works at least
partly: in the Rasa il. there are references to “epistles”, which do not form a part
of the work - at least as we know it - but works entitled in a similar manner can
be found in the Jdbirian corpus (Marquet 1986a: 41) 58 . Another work of the cor¬
pus of this study, which is closely connected with Jabirian writings, is Sirr al-
khalTqa. Kraus and Plessner (1991: 359) mention that the influence of the Sabians
of Harran can be found in works attributed to Jabir, and they name the Sirr as the
direct source of these views for the Jabirian author(s).

The history of the works included in the Jabirian Corpus is not easy to define.
First of all, a question without definite answer is the identity of the author/s of the
texts pertaining to the corpus. The earliest source for the details concerning the
life and works of Jabir ibn Hayyan is Ibn an-Nadlm’s Fihrist. 59 Already here some
legendary elements are attached to the person, and suspicions about the existence
of such a person were raised as early as during the tenth century. Although some
current scholars still maintain the belief in the historical character of Jabir ibn
Hayyan (see, e.g., Haq 1994: 3-32), Kraus’s criticism of this traditional narrative
is valid. According to him, the texts attributed to Jabir are composed by different
authors. In support of this view, he mentions the large range of scientific disci¬
plines treated in the works. Also the plenitude of the texts implies that they were
not composed by one single author (Kraus and Plessner 1991: 358).

Another radical conclusion Kraus came to concerns the dating of the texts.
Those scholars who consider Jabir to be a historical figure assume that he lived
during the eighth century and, hence, date the texts to the very early stages of Is¬
lamic science. 60 Ruska (1937: 312) and later Kraus (1942: xlviii-lxv) managed to
prove that many important texts pertaining to the corpus cannot have been written
before the mid-ninth century, some of them only in the first half of the tenth. As
proof of this Kraus mentions the gnostic system of the works, which he refers to
as “gnostic syncretism”, reflecting ghuldt views that only appeared at the end of
the ninth century and the religious terminology that can be traced back to Qarma-
tian Isma Tlism. The scientific terminology of the works, which is based on that of
Hunayn ibn Ishaq, also supports the late date of composition.

In addition to this article, two years later Marquet published a monograph on the same
theme: La philosophic des alchimistes el l 'alchimie des philosophes: Jabir ibn Hayyan et les
“Freres de la Purete". Marquet’s views presented in this monograph have been criticized,
for instance, by Haq (1992).

In the Fihrist , Jabir is referred to as Abu ‘Abdallah Jabir ibn Hayyan ibn 'Abdallah al-Kufi.
His kunya, however, appears elsewhere also in the form Abu Musa. On the classical story of
Jabir, see Kraus 1943: xl-xlv.

According to Holmyard (1922-1923: 47), Jabir was bom between 730 and 735 and died
about 80 years later.

58

Kraus (1943) lists altogether 2,982 works in the Jabirian corpus. 61 Some of
them are long texts, but many consist of only a couple of pages. 62 In addition to
alchemy, the corpus touches upon various fields of science, among them medi¬
cine, astrology and magic. Because of this and the numerous references to ancient
authors, Kraus and Plessner (1991: 358) draw a parallel between the Jabirian
Corpus and the Ikhwan: “No alchemical work of Islam reveals such vast
knowledge of ancient literature or has such an encyclopaedic character as the writ¬
ings of Djabir. In this they resemble Rasd’il Ikhwan al-Safd\ which, by the way,
come from the same source.”

From the Jabirian Corpus, I have chosen some texts which are relevant to the
perspective of this study. I do not claim that microcosmic references would not
appear in other Jabirian works as well - actually Kraus (1943: 7) characterizes the
parallelism between three worlds (macrocosm, microcosm, meaning the human
being, and mesocosm, referring to the art of alchemy) as one of the favourite doc¬
trines of the Jabirian authors. Some of the texts included in this study, such as
Kitdb ar-rahma (The Book of Mercy) pertain to the core of the Jabirian Corpus
and are extensively studied. Kitdb ar-rahma is referred to in many other Jabirian
works and is considered to be an early text among them (Kraus 1943: 7). I will
employ Berthelot’s edition of the work. Of the three books of Kitdb ustuqus al-uss
(The Book of the Fundamental Element) edited by Holmyard, especially the first,
Kitdb ustuqus al-uss al-awwal 6i , deals with microcosmism. It belongs to the CXII
books, which treat practical alchemy and, according to Kraus, the three works
named Kitdb ustuqus al-uss placed at the beginning of the listings of this group
form a basis for the other works following them (Kraus 1942: 10-11). In the CXII
books the theory of balance is not an essential element, but the 144 works which
Kraus refers to as “the Books on Balance” are dedicated to its treatment (Kraus
1943: 75). Of them I will examine Kitdb al-mTzdn as-saghTr (The Little Book of
Balance), which is edited by Kraus himself. Some of the texts, however, like
Kitdb al- 'awalim (The Book of the Worlds), have not been edited. Although, Im¬
practical reasons, my main attention is on the edited texts, I will present some
examples from it because of its huge and obvious relevance from the perspective
of microcosmism. The history of this work and its position in the collection is
uncertain (Kraus 1943: 133).

61 There are two catalogues of writings which are said to originate from Jabir himself. The first
contains 267 alchemical works and the second, which is not restricted to alchemy, as many
as 4,000. For more on these lists, see Ruska 1929: 1270-1275.

6 ~ Haq (1994: 11-12) criticizes the way Kraus reads as separate works some treatises that can,
in his opinion, be regarded as parts or chapters of a larger work.

63 The complete name of the work as it appears in Holmyard’s edition is Kitdb ustuqus al-uss
'ala ra 'y al-falasifa wa huwa ’l-awwal min thalatha (The First of the Three Books of the
Fundamental Element in the Opinion of Philosophers).

59

2.3.3 Sufism

It is generally acknowledged that the microcosmic idea is extensively elaborated
by Sufi thinkers. As noted above (see 2.2), some scholars, especially Diwald, have
emphasized the close relationship between the Ikhwan and Sufism. Among indi¬
vidual notions whose elaborations in the Rasa 'il have had impact on later Sufism
she mentions the microcosm-macrocosm analogy (Diwald 1979: 21). Although
the closeness of Sufi views to those of the Ikhwan in general is a debated matter,
their influence in later Sufism seems undisputed. I will discuss Sufi elaborations
of the analogy in the context of three essential Sufi thinkers. All of them employ it
but, as will be seen, in different ways. 64

2.3.3.1 Al-GhazalT

The influence of the Rasa 'il on al-Ghazall’s thought is generally accepted and was
already under discussion in mediaeval sources. Ibn Sab'In (d. 1270) considered
the Ikhwan to be an essential source for him (Tibawi 1955: 44). According to
Awa (1948: 311-312) “un des meilleurs temoignages de V influence des Freres sur
les Penseurs musulmans nous est donne dans la cas de Ghazzali.” 65 De Callatay
(2005b: 109) describes the case of al-Ghazall as “typical of the level of hypocrisy
an author may reach when it comes to acknowledgement of sources, for though he
dismissed the work of the Brethren, he adopted a number of their views without
acknowledgement.” As an example of this he mentions the classification of sci¬
ences.

Abu Hamid Muhammad ibn Muhammad al-Ghazall (c. 1056 66 —1 111) was
born in Tus, to where he also returned for the last years of his life. During his ca¬
reer, al-Ghazall worked in various intellectual centres in the heartlands of the Is¬
lamic world including the Nizamiyya in Baghdad. After experiencing a spiritual
crisis - the second of its kind in al-Ghazall’s life - he left Baghdad in 1095. 67 Af¬
ter this, he spent eleven years leading the ascetic life of Sufi and stayed for some

Some aspects of the influence of the Ikhwan’s microcosmism on al-Ghazah’s and Ibn
'Arabl’s thought have previously been examined by Takeshita (1987: 74-99).

Awa (1948: 311-313) mentions among the obvious influences the magical square, some
moral issues and the concept of music.

In many sources 1058 is given as al-Ghazall’s year of birth. Griffel (2009: 23-25) contests
these views and considers 1055-1057 to be more feasible.

His final reasons for leaving Baghdad, are, however, contested. According to some, this was
on account of the criticism he received from ' ulama some consider it was the political
situation after the murder of Nizam al-Mulk which struck terror into him. See Watt 1991:
1039.

60

time in at least Damascus, Jerusalem and the Arabian Peninsula. For the last five
years of his life, he returned to teaching first in Nishapur and, finally, in Tus. 68

Al-Ghazall wrote on different fields of religious sciences. In this study, I am
principally interested in his books on Sufism. Most of these works pertain to his
later production. His most important work Ihyd ’ 'ulum ad-din (Revival of the Re¬
ligious Sciences, from here on the Ihyd ’) was written during his period of asceti¬
cism. The work consists of four parts, each having ten chapters or books. Espe¬
cially interesting from the perspective of the microcosm-macrocosm analogy is
the 21st book 'Ajd’ib al-qalh (Marvels of the Heart). The Ihyd' is a book on Is¬
lamic practice and clothes its Sufi message, as Buchmann (1998: xxvii) puts it: “in
long theological, philosophical, and juridical passages more palatable to the tastes
of theologians, philosophers, and jurists than that of nonspecialists”. I have used
al-Ahmadl’s (2005) edition. If the Ihyd ' was aimed at readers outside of the Sufi
tradition, Mishkdt al-anwdr (The Niche of Lights, in the following referred to as
the Mishkdt), however, is more explicitly a Sufi work and in it the author address¬
es readers who are already within the Sufi tradition. The Mishkdt is a treatise
which is constructed as a commentary on the Light Verse of the Qur’an (Q.
24:35), and in its three chapters some basic elements of the Sufi worldview, such
as emanationist cosmology, are present. 69 Microcosmism is present in the work,
but it does not stand in as important a position as one might expect in comparision
to other Sufi works. In addition to its importance as a Sufi work, the Mishkdt is
included in the corpus for its irrefutable influence on later IshraqI thinkers, such as
SuhrawardI (Walbridge 2001: 54-57). Buchman’s (1998) edition of the Mishkdt is
used. In addition to these works, I will also give some individual examples from
al-Ghazall’s ethical work Mizdn al- amal, his famous criticism on the views of
philosophers Tahdfut al-faldsifa and Kimiyd-yi sa 'ddat, his Persian abridgement
of the Ihyd

2.33.2 SuhrawardI

SuhrawardT’s thought is related to the Rasd’il in many particular contexts. Her¬
metic features in his thought have been seen to have influenced the Ikhwan: John
Walbridge (2001: 40) mentions the Rasd’il as a probable source for the ideas of
the Harranian Sabianism in his ouvre. On the other hand, in her examination of
the metaphor of light in the Rasa 'il, Baffioni (2008b) makes an interesting open¬
ing for the discussion on the Ikhwan’s possible influence on Avicennian and -
directly or indirectly - Suhrawardian light metaphorism.

For a detailed critical overview of al-Ghazali’s biography, see Griffel 2009: 19-59.

69

These very views have aroused suspicions concerning the authenticity of the third chapter of
the Mishkdt, which can easily be found to be inconsistent with al-Ghazall’s criticism towards
philosophy in his earlier production. On this discussion, see Watt 1949.

61

Shihab ad-DIn Abu al-Futuh Yahya ibn Habash ibn Amlrak as-Suhrawardl (c.
1154-1191) was bom in Suhraward in northwestern Iran. He studied and travelled
in various places in Anatolia and Syria and spent the last eight years of his short
life in Aleppo. A turning point in his life happened some time before his arrival to
Aleppo, when, in his own words, Aristotle appeared to him in a dream and con¬
vinced him of the existence of Platonic forms. In philosophical views this meant
placing the wisdom of the Ancients and some Sufis above peripatetic philosophy,
and Walbridge (2000: 111) refers to this as a “conversion to Platonism”.
SuhrawardI is often distinguished from other sages from the same village by his
enemies with the name “al-Maqtul” (the Executed) and by his supporters with the
name “ash-Shahld” (the Martyr). Although his destiny is obscure, according to
most, he was ordered to be executed by Saladdin for his political activities or
simply starved to death in the chaotic circumstances of his times. 70

SuhrawardT’s writings, estimated to be around 50 items (Ziai 1997: 782), are
divided by Walbridge (2000: 16) into four groups: 1) allegorical stories 2) writ¬
ings of his youth, 3) peripatetic writings 4) Hikmat al-ishraq. In addition to these,
Walbridge mentions a variety of other works, such as prayers. 71

SuhrawardI himself defines Hikmat al-ishraq (Philosophy of Illumination, in
the following referred to as the Hikma) as his masterwork. It was completed in
1186. The work is constituted of two parts, the first being more clearly peripatetic
and the second concentrating on IshraqI views. As will be seen, the microcosmic
idea is only marginally relevant in the Hikma. However, I have included it in this
study because of its huge importance in SuhrawardT’s production. The edition
used in this study is that of Walbridge and Ziai (1999).

Some of Suhrawardi’s allegorical stories, which clearly belong to the Sufi tra¬
dition, are obviously relevant from the perspective of microcosmism. Of special
interest in this study are Fi haqiqat al- ishq (On the Reality of Love, also known
as Yd mu ’nis al- 'ushshdq, The Solace of Lovers) and Avdz-i parr-i Jibrd 71 (The
Sound of Gabriel’s Wing). Both are originally written in Persian. The exact date
of composition of SuhrawardT’s allegorical works is not known, but they are often
considered to have been written during the early stages of his life. Possibly be¬
cause of their early composition, IshraqI views are not present in these stories.
They are addressed to novices rather than other philosophers, which might be a
reason for them being written in Persian and, as Walbridge points out, this might
also be why the more elaborated philosophical ideas are omitted from them.

On details of Suhrawardi’s life, see, e.g., Walbridge 2000: 13-17.

Ziai (1996: 436—437), divides Suhrawardi’s works in a slightly different manner: as the first
group he mentions the Arabic philosophical works including the Hikma, as the second
Arabic and Persian allegorical stories and, thirdly, as its own group, devotional prayers and
invocations together with aphorisms and short statements.

62

(Walbridge 2000: 109-111) In the case of allegorical stories, I have used W. M.
Thackston’s edition, which is based mostly on the edition of Seyyed Hossein
Nasr.

An interesting work from the perspective of this study is Haydkil an-nur
(Temples of Light). It is a rather obscure work and there is no certainty whether it
was originally written in Arabic or in Persian. Walbridge (2000: 114) characteriz¬
es it as a “popular Peripatetic work” which SuhrawardI composed for a general
audience and it does not contain his characteristic provocative views. Walbridge
(2000: 212) dates this work to his youth and mentions that there were at least sev¬
en commentaries written on it. In this study, I refer to OwjabT’s Arabic edition.
Interestingly, however, in Shaykh Tosun Bayrak al-Jerrahi al-Halveti’s English
translation of the work there are some passages which are especially relevant for
the microcosm-macrocosm analogy. Al-Halveti bases his translation on three
Turkish translations of the work: Ismail Ankaravi’s translation from the seven¬
teenth century, Yusuf Ziya’s from 1924, and Saffet Yetkin’s from 1960 (al-
Halveti 2006: 30). I have had no access to these translations, but I will refer to the
passages missing from the Arabic edition in footnotes, because they may indicate
some interesting additions/omissions of the passages concerning microcosmism,
which could be considered in a more detailed study of this particular work.

2.33.3 I bn Arab!

The microcosmic idea is prominent in the works of Ibn ‘ArabI and it would not be
an exaggeration to say that in them Islamic microcosmism took one of its most
elaborate forms. Muhyl ad-DIn Muhammad ibn ‘All ibn al-Arabl (1165-1240)
was born in Murcia. He spent many years travelling around the Islamic world,
first on the Iberian Peninsula and in North Africa and later he continued further to
the east. Around the year 1223 he settled down in Damascus, where he spent the
rest of his life. Estimates of his works vary from Brockelmann’s (Ate§ 1986: 708)
239 to Osman Yahia’s (1964) 846 works, treatises and collections of poetry. It is
not only the number of works which is amazing in Ibn ‘ ArabI’s case, but also the
fact that his magnum opus al-Futuhdt al-makkiyya is a huge work and consisting
of 560 chapters. 72

From the wide corpus of writings composed by Ibn ‘ArabI, I have included in
my study only at-TadbTrdt al-ildhiyya fi isldh al-mamlakat al-insdniyya (Divine
Governance of the Human Kingdom, in the following referred to as the TadbTrdt).
The TadbTrdt is a work which declares the way “the human kingdom” should be
ruled and transmits an ethical ideal according to which a mystic should live. The
work is divided into 22 chapters, and I have used H.S. Nyberg’s edition. Nyberg

For more on Ibn 'Arabi’s life and works, see Chittick 1989: x-xvi.

63

(1919: 16-17) mentions the Ikhwan as a source of microcosmic ideas in the
TadbTrdt.

2.3.4 Ajd ib al-makhluqat

An obvious feature of the Rasa 'il is its encyclopaedic nature. Because of this, it is
useful to include a representative of this kind of literature in this study. 73 Al-
Qazwlnl’s ' Ajd’ib al-makhluqat has been chosen for several reasons. Possible
influences of the Ikhwan on their later colleague al-QazwInl have been indicated
in some particular topics, like astrological embryology (Widengren 1980: 308),
and have been considered at a more general level by Syrinx von Hees (2002).
Most importantly, in al-QazwInl’s writings we can find some microcosmic pas¬
sages and features which are surprisingly similar to those which appear in the
Rasa ’il.

There is very little certainty about the life of the author of 'Ajd ’ib al-
makhluqat wa ghard ’ib al-mawjiiddt (Marvels of Creation and Rarities of Exist¬
ing Things, in the following referred to as the 'Ajd’ib). Abu Yahya Zakariyya ibn
Muhammad ibn Mahmud al-QazwInl was born to an Arab family in the city of
Qazwln in 1203. In his own writings, he describes his travels around the Islamic
world, but it seems probable that he did not visit all the places he reports that he
visited. He worked as a qadl in various parts of the Islamic world, at least in Wash
and Hilla, and, according to some, also stayed for some time in Damascus, where
he met Ibn 'Arabl. He spent the last years of his life in Baghdad working under
the patronage of the well-known historian al-Juwaynl (d. 1283), who from 1259
on worked as the governor of Baghdad, lower Mesopotamia and Khuzistan. It
seems likely that al-QazwInl also died in Baghdad around 1283. 74

Al-QazwInl produced two works which have sometimes been considered parts
of a single encyclopaedia. The geographical work Athdr al-bildd wa akhbdr al-
'ibdd (also known as Ajd 'ib al-bulddn) is constructed according to the seven cli¬
matic zones and in it al-QazwInl describes in alphabetical order the cities, moun¬
tains, rivers and other geographical attractions of the world. Al-QazwTnI’s other
work 'Ajd’ib al-makhluqat is discussed in this study. The 'Ajd’ib is thought to
have started a whole new tradition of cosmographical works in the Islamic world
and, even if it was not the first of its kind, its systematic nature made it hugely
popular for centuries. Translations of the 'Ajd’ib were produced from very early
on, for example, in Persian, Turkish and Mongolian.

73

On encyclopaedic tradition in the mediaeval Islamic world, see van Gelder 1997.

74, . .

There are different stories regarding the details of al-Qazwim’s life. According to Bieniek

(2002: 29-30), he lived most of his life in Damascus, where he also died. For more on his

life, see von Hees 2002: 19-90.

64

The 'Ajd’ib describes the whole created universe. The work is divided into
two parts, the first treating the celestial, higher reality, ‘ ulwiyydt, and the second
concentrating on the terrestrial, lower sufliyydt. The first part starts with a descrip¬
tion of the mechanics of the spheres and their influence on the sublunar world and
continues by describing each of the planets, fixed stars and zodiacal signs, and the
inhabitants of the higher realm: angels and jinns. Before going into details con¬
cerning the terrestrial world, al-QazwInl describes different calendar systems. The
second part commences from the elements, continues with climes, different geo¬
graphical formations and finally moves on to the makhluqat, the creatures of the
sublunar sphere: minerals, plants, animals and man. Lastly, al-QazwInl provides a
description of the ghosts, demons and other oddities in the terrestrial world. I will
be concentrating on the chapter on man.

Both of al-QazwInl’s works still lack a critical edition. I will be referring to
the rather old edition of Wiistenfeld (1849). Considering the same passages in a
more recent edition of the work (2000), I have noted some interesting differences,
which I will elaborate on in the footnotes.

2.3.5 Additional Texts

Outside the actual corpus, some examples will also be taken mainly from two fur¬
ther works, Ghayat al-hakm and Rawda-yi taslim. Ghayat al-hakun (The Aim of
the Sage, from here on referred to as the Ghaya) is one of the most remarkable
works on celestial magic in the Islamic tradition. It has an obscure history and
there is no consensus about its author. The work has traditionally been attributed
to the mathematician Maslama al-Majrltl (d. between 1005-1008), but, among
others David Pingree (1980: 1) refutes the attribution claiming that it was com¬
posed on the Iberian Peninsula about half a century after al-Majrltl’s death. More
recent studies, however, date the work to a much earlier period. Maribel Fierro
(1996) convincingly argues that it was composed during the first half of the tenth
century by the muhaddith and magician Abu 1-Qasim Maslama ibn Qasim al-
Qurtubl (d. 964). There are some passages which are indubitably influenced by
the Rasa ’il and the discussion concerning the dating of the Ghaya is bound to¬
gether with that of the Rasd’il. Fierro (1996: 108-109) argues for an early compo¬
sition of the Rasa 'il, stating that Maslama ibn Qasim became acquainted with the
work during his stay in Basra before the year 93 6. 75 Pingree (1980: 2-3) mentions
the Rasa 'il along with some Jabirian texts and the Sirr as sources for the Ghaya.

In the traditional view, the introduction of the Rasa’il on the Iberian Peninsula has been
attributed to al-Majritl’s student al-Kirmanl (d. 1066/1075). Fierro (1996: 108), however,
suggests that the work became known in the area through Maslama ibn Qasim. This view is
supported by, among others, Hamdani (1999: 78) and de Callatay (2013: 336).

65

A multitalented scholar NasTr ad-DIn TusI (d. 1274) is best known for his as¬
tronomical innovations. He spent almost three decades among Nizarls, and it was
during this period, around the year 1243, that he completed Rawda-yi taslim (Par¬
adise of Submission, from here on referred to as the Rawda ) also known as
Tasawwurat. The Rawda forms a unique kind of compendium of mediaeval Nizarl
Isma'TlT thought and it has even been considered the major Nizarl text from the
whole Alamut period (Daftary 2007: 380). Hermann Landolt (2005: 6) mentions
that there are similarities in the cosmological views presented in the Rasd’il and
the Rawda.

66

3. THE MICROCOSMIC IDEA AND T H E HUMAN SPECIES

Know that, when the ancient wise considered this material world ( at- 'alam al-jismam)
with their eyes, witnessed the outward signs of the things with their senses, contem¬
plated these situations with their intellects, studied the behaviour of all the individuals
with their eyes and considered species of the individuals with their reflection, they
found none, out of all of them, more complete in its structure and more perfect in its
form or as a whole more strongly resembling this material world than the human being.

(R 11: 456—457)

By human-specific microcosmism I mean the occurrences of the analogy in which
the microcosmic position is described as an innate feature pertaining to the human
species. The passage above is from the very beginning of the Rasa TV’s epistle On
the Saying of the Wise that the Human Being is a Microcosm and it claims two
things. First, that it is the human being, among all beings, which is the microcosm.
This is affirmed by the authors in the next subsection of the epistle, in which they
say that “It is the human being only who is a sum total (jumla majmu'a ) of the
combined substances” (R II: 457). Secondly, since the “ancient wise” are said to
have needed both to consider physical reality and to contemplate the intellectual
in order to find out the microcosmic nature of man, this is clearly a feature con¬
nected both to the human body and the human soul. The former will be in focus in
this chapter: why is the role of the microcosm reserved specifically for the human
species and what does it tell about its place in creation? These are questions pri¬
marily related to cosmology. For this, the relevance of the microcosmic idea in the
context of the most important cosmological concepts will be evaluated. When
microcosmism is considered a specific feature of the human being, man is often
approached as the middle being, the combination of different aspects of reality.
Hence, in this chapter, the material and spiritual aspects of the human being are
mostly treated together.

This chapter will be divided into four parts, each of them examining the hu¬
man being in the cosmos from different perspectives. Firstly, I will consider the
position of microcosmic man in the cosmological system. The concentration will,
on the one hand, be on the universe as a whole as the macrocosm and, on the oth¬
er, on the features of the cosmological system which work well alongside the mi¬
crocosm-macrocosm analogy. Secondly, I will move on to the cosmological ar¬
chetype of the human being and the ways it is connected with the microcosmic
idea. Thirdly, the intermediate position of the human being in the universe will be
examined with special emphasis on the twofold nature of man. Fourthly, I will
scrutinize the topic of the human being dwelling on the earth and examine the
manner in which the microcosmic position defines his place among sublunar be¬
ings.

67

3.1 ANTHROPOMORPHIC COSMOLOGY

The human-specific microcosmism is closely connected to broader ontological
concepts and the microcosm-macrocosm analogy has various different functions
in descriptions of cosmological systems. The analogy between man and the uni¬
verse is quite often used in order to clarify the basic principles of cosmology,
mostly by comparing the psychophysical constitution of man with that of the uni¬
verse. Especially in the Rasa ’il, this is developed more extensively, which may be
due to the cosmological system being easily applicable to this kind of parallelism.

3.1.1 The Universe as an Animated Being

The cosmological use of microcosmism - unlike most of the metaphysically sig¬
nificant aspects of the analogy - also aroused interest among peripatetic thinkers.
Sometimes it is even regarded as a typical feature of mediaeval peripatetic philos¬
ophy. In the 14th discussion of Tahafut al-faldsifa entitled On their inability to set
a proof (to show) that heaven is an animal that obeys God, the Exalted, through
its circular motion, al-Ghazall introduces the following view:

They [philosophers] had said: Heaven is an animal, and it has a soul whose relation to
the body of heaven is similar to the relation of our souls to our bodies. Just as our bod¬
ies move voluntarily towards their goals through (their being) moved by the soul, the
same (is the case) with the heavens; and the purpose of the heavens in their essential
motion is to worship the Lord of the worlds, in a manner we will he mentioning, (al-
Ghazall (e): 144, trans. Marmura)

A common aspect of the microcosm-macrocosm analogy in the context of cos¬
mology which appears in this passage is its way of examining the macrocosm - in
this case the heavenly spheres, but at times the sublunar world or the whole uni¬
verse - as a unified entity and its manner of paralleling it with an animal, or some¬
times with a city or a human being. Al-Ghazall evidently uses this analogy more
as a means of describing the macrocosm in terms of the microcosm than the other
way around. 76 This is evidently a variation of Allers’s structural microcosmism
and, more specifically, its anthropocentric variant, which is defined to describe the
macrocosm through the human being. In this comparison, we can also find fea¬
tures of elementaristic microcosmism: the body and the soul appearing in the
heavens can also be found in man. 77

This has been, in the case of some comparisons of the Ikhwan, previously noted by Conger
(1922: 51). According to him, this is a special feature of the Islamic microcosmic idea.

As Allers (1944: 348) mentions, the line between the most developed forms of elementaristic
microcosmism and cosmocentric structural analogy is not always easy to define. According
to him, the main difference is the emphasis put “on the 'dynamic’ aspect” in the

68

An important characteristic of this kind of microcosm-macrocosm analogy is
that the microcosm is not necessarily the human being, but, as al-Ghazall de¬
scribes, any animated being ( hayawdn ). Similar overall references to the micro-
cosmic idea occur in the Rasa 'il as well, and sometimes the Ikhwan refer to the
analogy simply in order to emphasize the constitution of the universe as a unified
entity. For instance, in the epistle on astronomy (R I: 146), they mention that “the
world is one like a city is one, or like an animal is one”. In the description of the
essence of Nature in the 20th epistle (R II: 133), Nature is said to be like an ani¬
mal, whose parts are like the members of an animal.

The Ikhwan, however, elaborate this type of analogy further, and especially
the 34th epistle is - as its heading On the Saying of the Wise that the World is a
Large Man indicates - about the universe as a “large man” (or meganthropus)
(insdn kabTr). The basic idea of this view is summarized at the beginning of the
epistle:

Know that, regarding the saying of the wise that the world is a large man and their say¬
ing that the human being is a small world, we must make a clarification in order for
you to understand its real meaning: its meaning is that the world has a body ( jism ) and
a soul ( nafs ), by which they mean the surrounding sphere and the other beings consist¬
ing of substances and accidents it comprises. (R III: 212)

This topic recurs elsewhere in the Rasd’il: in the 16th epistle, the Ikhwan explicit¬
ly define the “world” ( al- ‘ Siam ) to mean the universe as a whole:

Know, oh brother, what the wise have said: by the world are meant the seven heavens
and the earths and all creatures in between them; they also call it the large man. This is
due to the fact that it is one body in which are combined the spheres, different layers of
the heavens, the four elements (arkan ummahdtihi ) and the creatures of the World of
Generation and Corruption. They also think that it has one soul, the faculties of which
flow in all parts of the body, like the human soul flows in all parts of the body of one
human being. (R II: 24-25)

In addition to being a unified sum of its parts and including the spiritual and the
material aspects, both man and the universe are constituted of the four elements 7 ’'

cosmocentric structural microcosmism, while in its elementaristic form the analogy is about
the elements simply appearing at both levels. In some comparisons, we will find references
to the corresponding faculties acting in the microcosm and the macrocosm, and for this they
could be defined as cosmocentric structural microcosmism as well.

The authors of the Rasa ’it follow a view of their time concerning the heavenly spheres are
constituted of a fifth element, ether. Contrarily to the four elements, ether is not subject to
generation and corruption and no change occurs in it. According to Nasr (1978: 62), there
was a division concerning this throughout the Middle Ages between the “Aristotelian” and
the “Hermetic” traditions. The former considers cosmos as divided into two distinct regions:
the sublunar world made of the four elements and the heavens being constituted of ether,
which is completely different from the sublunar world, and does not have the four natures of
hotness, moistness, dryness and coldness. As for the thinkers whom Nasr defines as

69

- an aspect of the elementaristic microcosm-macrocosm analogy in its more de¬
veloped form (Allers 1944: 344).

Like in the widely-spread forms of the analogy, for the Ikhwan as well, the
twofold nature of the universe is often presented as an explanation for the analo¬
gy. In the 32nd epistle (R III: 188) it is said that: “In the construction of the human
being are combined all meanings of beings, both simple and compound, as we
have mentioned, because the human being is a combination of the thick, material
body and the simple, spiritual soul. For this, the wise call the human being a mi¬
crocosm and the world a large man.” The Ikhwan, however, examine the resem¬
blance between the microcosm and the macrocosm and the cosmological idea of
the Universal Soul dominating the physical parts of reality in more detail, 79 and
they also attach this to the theory of emanation:

The world’s body ( jism ) with all its parts - simple, combined and muwalladat - follows
the ways of the body of a human being or an animal with all its body parts of varying
forms and different shapes. Its soul with all its faculties that flow in the parts of its
body, moving and ruling the types of beings, their species and their individuals, is like
the soul of a human being or any animal, flowing in all its body parts and joints of its
body, moving and ruling all members and senses of its body. (R III: 212-213)

Again, the Ikhwan often follow the analogy also used by peripatetic thinkers, and
being a microcosm is not restricted to the human beings exclusively, but concerns
other hayawan as well. 80 Later in the same epistle, they extend the analogy and
affirm that analogical structures are found elsewhere as well: in a tree and in a
forge of the craftsman (R III: 214-217, see 5.1.1).

In the Jabirian Corpus, the division of the universe into the “larger” and the
“smaller” worlds is presented as an even more complex system:

The world is two worlds, a larger (akbar) and a smaller ( asghar f . The larger is the
higher body and the spiritual substances above manifest their activities in it. The small¬
er is the world below the higher body until the Earth. It is also said that the smaller is
the human being; the smaller is called (a world) according to the larger, because it is
quite like it. (Kitab ar-rahma : 149)

Hermetic, represented also by the Ikhwan, the world forms a unified entity and ether, despite
its immutability, also possesses the four natures, which gives it a similarity with the sublunar
world required in the astrological theory. For a description of ether in the Rasa il, see R II:
46—48.

Comparisons examining the nature of the Soul, its faculties and its domination over physical
bodies will be discussed in more detail in 5.1.1.

See also, e.g., R III: 75-76 and III: 328.

As noted in 2.2.4 n. 52, the term “the smaller world” ( al- 'Slam al-asghar ) is used in the
Rasa 'il as well, but only in the 52nd epistle.

70

In this passage, the manifold correspondence which recurs at different layers of
reality is explicitly present: the Larger World refers to the universe as a whole -
or to the heavens - and the smaller either to the sublunar world or to the human
being. The parallelism between the Larger World and the human being is not ex¬
plained any further, the smaller is simply said to be “like the larger”. The spiritual

substances managing the material - a reference to the World Soul - are, however,

82

present.

Besides these more general descriptions of the universe as a whole, some par¬
ticular aspects of the world order are examined in the light of the microcosmic
idea in the Rasa il. As an illustration, resurrection as separation of the material
from the spiritual is often linked with the idea of the world as a large man. In the
19th epistle (R II: 88), the end of the world and the separation of all the bodies
from the Universal Soul - the great resurrection ( al-qiydma al-kubrd) - is ex¬
plained to be like the death of any individual animal, which likewise is the separa¬
tion of the body from the soul.*' 3

3.1.2 Emanation and the Microcosmic Idea

In addition to the explicit references to the microcosm-macrocosm analogy, Allers
(1944: 344) includes in anthropocentric structural microcosmism the use of the
notion of the World Soul, since it presumes that both the human being and the
universe are psychophysical entities, substantially divided into two. The World
Soul forms a part of most of the mediaeval cosmological systems. Nevertheless,
the microcosm-macrocosm analogy is in its more extensive cosmological form
especially suitable for systems like that of the Rasa 'il.

The microcosm-macrocosm analogy is a fundamental feature of Neoplatonic
cosmology - a tradition which greatly influences most of the texts of the corpus.
Also the cosmology of the Ikhwan is usually regarded as an interpretation of Neo¬
platonic emanationism. The Ikhwan add to the system of Plotinus six more levels.
The emanation proceeds from its origin, the Creator ( al-Bdri ), fust to the Univer¬
sal Intellect {al- 'aql al-kullT), then to the Universal Soul ( an-nafs al-kulliyya). Af¬
ter that, it emanates to the Prime Matter (al-hayula al-ula), Nature ( at-tabVa ), the
Absolute Body ( al-jism al-mutlaq), the spheres ( al-qfldk ), the four elements (al-

82

An analogy of this kind can also be found in the translation of Suhrawardl’s Hayakil an-nur,
but it does not appear in the Arabic edition of the text: "Man is the microcosm, the universe,
the macrocosm. Whatever exists in one exists in the other. The unifying level of all is al-aql
al-awwal, the first cause, the absolute necessity which is the soul of both. It is also the
Universal Intellect, the very first creation of God.” (SuhrawardI (f): 66, trans. al-Halveti)

83 ... •

Similar descriptions also appear, e.g., in the 16th epistle (R II: 49-50) and in the 39th epistle
(R III: 333), where it is explicitly linked with microcosmism by stating that the world is a
large man and the human being a microcosm.

71

arkan) and, finally, to the beings of the sublunar world ( al-muwalladat). & 4 (See,
e.g., R III: 196-197) 85

Often the cosmological system and the role of the human being as a unity af¬
ter diversity have been clarified through numerology. 86 In the first epistle (I: 53),
the Ikhwan discuss numbers as roots for everything. Numbers and their cosmolog¬
ical meanings are examined in detail again in the 32nd epistle On the Opinion of
the Pythagoreans regarding the Origin of the Intellectual Beings and in the epistle
following that. On the Opinion of Ikhwan as-Safd’ regarding the Intellectual
Origin, and the topic recurs in the epistle on the human being as a microcosm (R
II: 461-462). In the context of mathematics (R I: 53-54), it is told that because all
numbers are compositions of 1, 2, 3 and 4, the first four numbers stand as the ba¬
sis for the whole creation.’' 7 Later in the Rasd’il , the Ikhwan continuously examine
numbers through emanationistic cosmology and they are related to the first enti¬
ties, one to the Creator ( al-Bdri ), two to the Universal Intellect, three to the Uni¬
versal Soul and four to Nature and so on, until the last level of the emanation mu-
walladdt or mukawwandt, which is related to the number nine. Minerals, on the
other hand, are said to stand for tens, plants for hundreds, animals for thousands
and the mixture ( al-mizdj ), which could most likely be understood as the human
being, again as one. (See, e.g., R III: 181—182) 88

Though Neoplatonic cosmology received various formulations in Islamic
thought and especially in the IsmaTlI tradition, microcosmism maintained its
prominence in different systems. There are two points which, however, make the
system of the Ikhwan more easily applicable to the microcosm-macrocosm analo¬
gy than, for instance, al-Farabfs and later IsmaTlIs’s, such as al-Kirmanl’s, sys¬
tems. The fust is that the Ikhwan do not divide the intellect into several levels and

The cosmological system of the Ikhwan has been extensively studied by Nasr 1978: 44-104.

Baffioni (2008b: 164) remarks that alongside of this philosophical cosmology the Ikhwan
support the religious view of creation based on the word kun (see, e.g., R III: 19-20).

The idea that “the human being is a unity ( wahdatun ) after all plurality, like the Creator, his
praise be exalted, is unity before all plurality” appears, for instance, in the 26th epistle (R II:
475) and the context of the passage is treated in 5.3.1.2. De Callatay (2005a: 197-200)
considers the use of numbers in these ontological contexts to be a form of the Platonic mirror
metaphor in the Rasa 'it.

In the epistle on music (IV: 54-55) it is told that all units, tens, hundreds and thousands are
compounded from 1, 2, 3 and 4. “Substance is like 1, and the nine other categories are like
nine units. Four of them take precedence over the others: substance, quantity, quality, and
relationship, the others being compounds of these." (Trans. Wright, in W: 105)

In the Jabirian texts, numerology appears in a cosmological position as well. The ratios
1:3:5:8 are said to form the basis of the cosmological system and the four elements follow
these ratios in the composition of bodies. Carusi (1995) indicates that this ratio may have its
origins in the Pythagorean theory of proportions and in the lntroductio Arithmetica of
Nichomachus of Geresa.

72

therefore keep their cosmological system way rather simple. The second point
facilitating the microcosmic speculation in the cosmological frames of the Rasa ’il
is the definition of the Universal Soul and its relation to other hypostases. In the
Rasd’il , the human intellect is not examined separately from the soul, but as a
faculty of the soul (see 5.1.2) or as the human soul in its actualized form ( B : 158,
see 5.3.2.1). Sometimes when hypostases are treated together with microcosmism,
the Ikhwan also define the Universal Intellect in relation to the Universal Soul. In
the 32nd epistle (R II: 213), the Universal Intellect is seen as the divine faculty
helping the Universal Soul {al-quwwa al-ildhiyya al-mu’ayyida li-n-nafs al-
kiilliyya).

An important question in amalgamating Neoplatonic cosmology with micro¬
cosmism (see 1.2.2), posed by Schlanger (1968: 316), is also relevant in the case
of the Ikhwan: if man as the microcosm is an all-encompassing being and includes
creation in its entirety, how is man located in the hierarchy of beings? Both of
Allers’s propositions to avoid this contradiction - Neopythagorean influence or
the collective interpretation of the microcosm-macrocosm analogy - might solve
the problem in the case of the Ikhwan. The cosmology of the Ikhwan is not, how¬
ever, purely Neoplatonic and includes, among others, also Aristotelian influence.
In general the interpretation of emanationism represented by the Ikhwan seems to
adopt the idea of man as the microcosm quite easily.

The explicit comparisons presented in the first part of this subsection are
problematic from the point of view of this study. Metaphors, whose aim seems to
be simply to describe the cosmos as a unified system comparable to man, are ex¬
tensively used in all branches of Islamic thought. They do not clearly stand as any
kind of metaphysical claims or necessarily imply any more profound meaning
given to the microcosm-macrocosm analogy. Even the Ikhwan seem to treat this
kind of analogy in a manner different from its other forms: although in most of its
forms the microcosmic position in the Rasa ’il is clearly reserved for the human
being, 89 in these cosmological contexts the Ikhwan sometimes parallel the uni¬
verse with an animal or a city. In this way, these explicit comparisons do not nec¬
essarily represent metaphysical microcosmism and definitely do not restrict the
examination of the analogy with the human being, which was noted as a defining
feature of microcosmism in this study. In the cosmological frames of the Rasd’il,
these comparisons are, however, difficult to see as completely separate from other
more metaphysical forms of the analogy and they often appear connected with
them. Also the wide use of these cosmological comparisons in the Rasa ’il might
indicate that then meaning is here different from those of peripatetic works. For
the Ikhwan, the analogy between the universe and the human being may have tak-

89

Another exception of this kind is the comparisons between the heavens and different kinds of

societies, see 4.2.1.1.

73

en such an essential cosmological role because of their ontological system suitable
for this, or even vice versa - their interpretation of emanationism may have taken
that form precisely because of the importance of microcosmism for the Ikhwan.

3.2 THE HUMAN ARCHETYPE AS A MICROCOSM

Cosmologically the origin of humanity is considered to be the specific soul of the
human species or the Platonic idea of man. This kind of primordial man or cosmo¬
logical prototype of human species in this subsection will be referred to as the
human archetype. The human archetype is related to the creation of the individual
man and in some cases also to the perfection of the individual man. In the Rasa 'il,
the human archetype is presented as a microcosm in its various forms, which
arouses the question whether it might even explain the meaning of the analogy
more generally. 9(1

3.2.1 Adam and the Human-Specific Explanation of the Analogy

In the Rasa 'il, the hierarchy of souls is closely related to the specific archetypes of
each species. The specific soul ( an-nafs an-naw'iyya) can be seen as the archetype
of species, and, when it comes to the human species, the universal human rational
soul ( an-nafs an-ndtiqa al-insdniyya al-kidliyya) or simply the universal human
soul ( an-nafs al-kulliyya al-insdniyya) can be regarded as the human archetype.
Hence, the human archetype is the universal, purely spiritual forefather of human
beings of which each man is an individuation. As will be seen, the Ikhwan use the
term “the absolute universal human being” ( al-insdn al-mutlaq al-kulli) synony¬
mously with the universal human rational soul, and, in addition to this, as de Cal-
latay (2005b: 27) affirms, they refer to it also as Adam, or the First Adam (al-
Adam al-awwal). 91

I have previously examined this topic in an article, see Nokso-Koivisto and Svard 2013.

As de Callatay (2005b: 27-28) remarks, Adam has various roles in the Rasa’il and the
Ikhwan are not clear in their distinctions between different Adams. Adam occurs in the work
in at least three different contexts: firstly, as the archetypal man who is at times distinguished
from the other Adams with the term the First Adam; secondly, as the first created individual
man, the Qur anic Adam, who is sometimes referred to as the Earthly Adam ( al-Adam at-
turabi); and, thirdly, in the eschatology, a series of Adams appear at the beginning of each
world era. Marquet (1975: 209) examines these Adams through Isma TIT concepts and refers
to the universal human rational soul as the Celestial Adam: “Les Iliwan appellent l‘Adam
celeste «TAme parlante humaine universelle», ou «forme des formes»; c’est l’ame du
«genre» humain, en quelque sorte ame archetype de l’humanite. C’est elle qui est «calife de
Dieu sur sa terre», sur laquelle elle regne malgre la multiplicite de cette terre.”

74

As we can see in the following passage of the 22nd epistle, the human arche¬
type is the guardian angel of the human species and the vicegerent of God on
earth, who is the head of the other created souls:

Said the King, “Who is the chief angel charged with the care and welfare of the chil¬
dren of Adam? “That,” said the Sage, “is the universal human rational Soul [an-nafs
an-ndtiqa al-insaniyya al-kulliyya ], vicegerent of God [e.g., Q. 2:30] on his Earth. She
it was, who was linked to Adam’s body when he was formed from Earth, and the an¬
gels all bowed down to him together [Q. 15:30], These angels are the animal soul, di¬
rected by the rational. The universal rational soul is still in Adam’s seed, just as the
corporeal form of Adam’s body survives in his seed. (G: 228, trans. Goodman and
McGregor, in G: 274)

This passage clarifies the distinction between the Earthly Adam and his universal
counterpart: the human archetype is the soul appearing in the material form for the
first time in the first created man, and this seed or principle of humanity is trans¬
mitted through him further to the descendants of Adam.

The idea that the Earthly Adam is the first individuation of the human arche¬
type and all later individual human souls are its individuations is presented in the
ninth epistle. At the beginning of the epistle (R I: 297-298), there is a description
of the creation of the human being and it is told that man was created in the best
form (ft ahsan sura) of all animals. Tie was made capable of receiving all charac¬
teristics and to learn all sciences, humanities, mathematics, knowledge and poli¬
tics. Elis body was formed of different members and shapes and he was given all
human skills and activities as well as angelic deeds. “This was because the struc¬
ture of his body brought together all components of the mixture of the four ele¬
ments and all nine 9 " temperaments aiming at the balance (/' tidal) for it to be in the
right state and to be able to receive all characteristics of animals and specialities
of natures.” The Ikhwan affirm that all this was done to enable man to become
like God, whose vicegerent 93 he is on earth (e.g., Q. 2:30). Some pages later, there
is a lengthy description of the vicegerent of God as the human archetype, now
referred to also as the universal absolute man ( al-insdn al-mutlaq al-kulli ):

If a human being were innately to have all the characteristics (akhlaq), he would not
have difficulties in manifesting all the activities (af'dl) and all the arts ( sana’i ). But it
is not an individual man, only the absolute universal human being, who innately re¬
ceives every characteristic and is able to manifest all the arts and works. Know that all
people are individuations of this absolute human being, and he was the one we have
mentioned as the vicegerent of God on his Earth since the day of the creation of Adam,
the father of human beings, until the day of the Great Resurrection. It is the universal
human soul (an-nafs al-kulliyya al-insaniyya), which is present in all individual human
beings. Like God says, your creation and your upraising are but as a single soul. (Q.

This is exceptional. Usually the number of temperaments is said to be four, see 4.3.4.
Arberry translates khalifa as “viceroy”, but I find the form “vicegerent” more convenient.

75

94

31:28) we have explained in the epistle on resurrection. Know, oh brother, and may
God with a spirit from him help you, that this absolute man, whom we have said to be
the vicegerent of God on Earth, is innately able to receive all the human characteristics,
all the sciences of humanity and all the arts of wisdom. And he is present at all times
and eras, within each individual man. From the absolute man are manifested all the ac-

95

tivities, sciences, characteristics and arts of an individual. " Among the individuals,
however, some are better prepared than others to receive sciences, arts, characteristics
or works, which are manifested in them accordingly. (R I: 306)

Although the microcosm is not explicitly presented we can find various references
to microcosmism as it is defined in this study. First the vicegerent of God and
later the human archetype is defined as the microcosm from three different per¬
spectives. These nonspecific references to microcosmism are related to other con¬
texts in which the Ikhwan scrutinize the microcosmic man more profoundly and
can, for that, be analysed through them.

Firstly, the human archetype is said to innately have all the “characteristics”
(akhldq), which are later defined specifically to refer to human characteristics.
This reminds one of the idea of the human being bringing together the specialities
(khdssiyydt) of different animal species. 96 As will be seen in more detail below,
Allers (1944: 346-347) presents this as an example of elementaristic microcos¬
mism. There is, however, an essential difference - the passage above explicitly
refers only to human characteristics. The form of the analogy is, though, similar:
the microcosmic position arises from bringing together attributes and, thus, sum¬
marizing a larger collective of individuals (men) or a class of beings (animals).
Even more clearly this passage resembles the microcosm of nations in the 22nd
epistle, which, however, cannot be seen as its own “form of microcosmism” since
it occurs only as one brief reference in the Rasa 'il (see 3.4.2).

Secondly, the human archetype manifests “all the activities and arts”. This
might also be connected with passages treating some particular art or a science as
a microcosm, which fall into the category of aesthetic holistic microcosmism (see
5.4), or, on the other hand, with the ideal of an individual art appearing in the hu¬
man body, when the analogy is structural (see 4.3.1.2). What is to be noted, how¬
ever, is that in the latter the concentration is on the bodily aspect of man, while the
human archetype is a purely spiritual being. Alternatively, the human archetype as
a manifestation of “all the activities and arts” can be read as a reference to the all-

Ma khalqukum wa la ba ‘thukum ilia ka nafsin wahidatin. 1 have modified Arberry’s
translation of the verse, which is “your creation and your upraising are as but as a single
soul”. This verse of the Qur’an often appears in the Rasa’il in the descriptions of the
Universal Soul and is also through these contexts connected with the microcosmic idea. On
the appearance of this verse in the Rasa 'il, see Baffioni 2013.

Tazharu minhu af aluhu, iilumuhu, akhlaquhu wa Sana 7 'uhu.

For more on this, see 3.4.2.

76

ability of the human archetype and, hence, as a variation of the third aspect con¬
nected to knowledge.

Thirdly, the human archetype is said to be “innately able to receive” all the
sciences and skills of wisdom. This may be read through microcosmism in some
of its epistemological - or in Allers’s terms psychological - forms, for instance, as
a reference to the human intellect as a potential microcosm (see 5.3.2). As a hu¬
man-specific variation of epistemological microcosmism, it is of interest also in
the light of the Hippocratic Maxim (see 5.3.2.2 n. 258). The idea that the universal
man contains all knowledge is a natural consequence from the Qur anic view that
God taught Adam all names (Q. 2:31). The last sentence of the passage highlights
differences between human individuals: although it is the universal human arche¬
type who embodies all possibilities, some individual men are intellectually more
capable in all fields than others. 97

What is interesting about the Ikhwan’s passage describing the human arche¬
type is that in it microcosmism is understood as a feature shared by humanity as a
whole. Since the authors refer to various forms of the analogy, it could even be
interpreted as a clarification of the meaning of the idea in general: do the Ikhwan
in this passage indicate that microcosmism is something specific for the human
being and does not have much to do with an individual human being? 98 It is to be
noticed, however, that in this context the human being is considered only at the
level of the soul, and the physiological aspect - undisputedly essential for the au¬
thors of the Rasa 'il - is excluded. Furthermore, it is noteworthy that references to
the human archetype cannot be found in the microcosmic epistles.

One possible perspective to the human archetype is its attachment to the con¬
cept of the Imam. Marquet (1975: 209) remarks that the human archetype (or, as
he calls it, “Adam celeste”) is, more than anything, the archetypal soul of all the
prophets and Imams. In the 47th epistle (R IV: 125), where the Imam is described,
it is said that the (good) properties ( khisdl ) of man are brought together in one
human individual, who is the I mam. In the light of the description of the human
archetype bringing together all human characteristics ( akhldq ), the possibility that
the passage above would refer to (the soul of) the Imam cannot be discounted. 99

An interesting detail, which appears in the description of the vicegerent of God, but is not
repeated in the context of the human archetype, is that the description of man, including his
microcosmic features, is explained by making man God-like. From the perspective of
microcosmism this could be read as an idea that God would form the third level in the
microcosm-macrocosm analogy, a view which is extensively elaborated by Ibn 'Arab!, see
5.3.3.2.

This topic will be treated from the perspective of knowledge in 5.3.2.2.

A unique individual representing the virtues of the whole species appears also at the level of
prophets. In the 42nd epistle (R III: 496), it is said that in Muhammad God brought together

77

Adam is also presented as the microcosm in the Mishkdt al-anwar, in which
al-Ghazall ((b): 31) says that “God showed beneficence to Adam. He gave him an
abridged form that brings together every sort of thing found in the cosmos. It is as
if Adam is everything in the cosmos, or an abridged transcription ( nuskha ) of the
world.” (Trans. Buchman) Al-Ghazall does not, at least in this context, go into
details of the cosmological position of Adam. It seems that this is more of a refer¬
ence to the microcosmic Adam as the representative of the human species than to
the human archetype as the microcosm in particular.

Although not employing the terms occurring in the Rasd'il, the author of
Ghdyat al-hakm presents a similar view of the human archetype as that of the
Ikhwan. In the Ghdya (48-50), the archetypal human being is referred to as the
universal man ( al-insdn al-kullT) and the form of the universal man is said to be
found in the form of an individual man. This universal man is a purely intellectu¬
al, spiritual being, which is constituted of simple substance. Whereas an individu¬
al man is the combined, evanescent form in the lower world ( al- 'dlam al-asfal),
the universal man is a pure form, unattached to matter, and pertains to the higher
world ( al- dlam al-a 'la). It is explained that an individual, physical man, consist¬
ing of the thick material and appearing as a combination of the soul, particular
intellect, and a body, is merely a husk or an image ( sanam ) of the universal man.
This relationship also clarifies the cosmological position of the human archetype:
while the form (sura) of an individual man is like a husk or an image of the form
of the universal man, the form of the universal man is like a husk or an image of
the Universal Soul ( an-nafs al-kulliyya). The form of the Universal Soul, on the
other hand, is a husk or an image of the Universal Intellect (al- 'aql al-kullT) whose
form, finally, is a husk or an image of the Light. In the Ghdya the universal man is
not explicitly described as a microcosm, but it is said that in him, “there is resem¬
blance of all things” (49).

The Ikhwan do not define the human archetype in the frame of their cosmolo¬
gy as clearly as the author of the Ghdya, but what is evident is that it is different
from that of the earthly human being. The earthly Adam, being the last one to be
created, stands evidently at the ninth stage of the emanationistic system. As de
Callatay (2005b: 27-28) mentions, the First Adam, meaning the human archetype,
is located in a very high rank in the emanationistic system of the Ikhwan.

all the qualities (khisal) of all angels and prophets. The same is said to apply to three other
prophets as well, Da’ud (David), Sulaiman (Solomon) and Yusuf (Joseph).

78

3.2.2 Gabriel - the Platonic Idea of the Human Being

SuhrawardI treats the topic of the human archetype in many of his works. In the
Hikma, the cosmological position of the human archetype is defined by means of
the Suhrawardian metaphorical language of light:

From one of the dominating lights, the incorporeal light that is the controlling light in
the human fortresses is brought in the being for the human - the most perfect - consti¬
tution. That dominating light [nur qahir] is the lord of the talisman [sahib at-tilism\ of
the rational species. It is Gabriel - upon him be peace! - the proximate among the
mighty lords of the kingdom of dominance. It is “Ravan-Bakhsh,” the holy spirit, the
bestower of knowledge and confirmation, the giver of life and virtue. This emanated
light is the managing light [nur mudabbir ], the “commander of humanity,” that which
calls itself “I.” (SuhrawardI (a): 132, trans. Walbridge and Ziai)

Gabriel is the lord of the talisman ( sahib at-tilism ) of the human species, the dom¬
inating light which controls the individual managing lights - in this case the indi¬
vidual human souls. The Suhrawardian human archetype is usually referred to as
Gabriel, which lays emphasis on the human archetype as the guardian angel of the
human species, a view which, as we saw, also occurs in the Rasa ’il. The Persian
name used of the human archetype is Ravan-Bakhsh, the Giver of Spirit which -
as well as the role of the angel Gabriel in the descent of the Qur’an - emphasizes
the role of the human archetype as the transmitter of the spiritual and, in the case
of Gabriel, divine knowledge to the material world.

It seems quite clear that for SuhrawardI, the dominating lights are Platonic
ideas, as Walbridge and Ziai (SuhrawardI (a): 195) affirm. 100 In his discussion on
universals, SuhrawardI refers to the views of the ancients, Plato among others, and
says:

When they said ‘there is a universal man in the world of intellect,’ they meant that
there is a dominating light containing different interacting rays and whose shadow
among magnitudes is the form of man. It is a universal - not in the sense that it is a
predicate, but in the sense that it has the same relation of emanation to these individu¬
als. It is as though it were the totality and the principle. This universal is not that uni¬
versal whose conception does not preclude being shared; for they believe that it has a
particularized essence and that it knows its essence. How, then, can it be a universal
idea? When they called one of the spheres a universal orb and another particular, they
did not mean 'universal’ in the sense used in logic. (SuhrawardI (a): 109, trans. Wal¬
bridge and Ziai)

This is not clear in the thought of the Ikhwan, and Platonic ideas have been seen as
contradictory to their evolutionistic view concerning species (see 3.4.1). In the 22nd epistle
( G: 141), the Ikhwan put into the mouth of the Jinni philosopher a passage in which they
refer to Platonic ideas. In this case, it is not clear whether the authors agree with the view or
not.

79

This passage indicates that Suhrawardl does not use the term “universal” in the
sense of logic, but it has a metaphysical meaning similar to the Platonic idea. The
archetype or talisman is for Suhrawardl the essence of the existing thing, and he
remarks that: “[i]f the nature of anything is taken without its qualities, it is the
light for which that thing is the image” (Suhrawardl (a): 131). If the human arche¬
type is seen as the Platonic idea of man, it should also contain the ideal state of the
human being, and as such, be the model for the perfect man. Hence, this should be
the case at least in Suhrawardl’s text, although it is not explicitly expressed. 101

The Suhrawardian human archetype is also presented as the Active Intellect.
In Haydkil an-niir, Suhrawardl ((d): 11) mentions that “of the sum of dominating
lights is our father and the lord of the talismans of our species, through which our
souls emanate and are perfected by the Holy Spirit. Among the wise, it is called
the Active Intellect ( al- 'aql al-fa ' a/).”

In the Hikma and in Haydkil an-nur, Gabriel is not linked with microcos-
mism, but in the allegorical story Avdz-i parr-i Jibrd 7/ there is a passage which is
of interest from this perspective:

Gabriel has two wings, the right wing is pure light, the totality of which is an abstrac¬
tion of the relation between his being and God. The left wing has traces of darkness,
like dark spots on the surface of the moon that resemble peacock’s feet. That is a sign
that his being has one side toward non-being [...] Therefore the vainglorious world of
sound and shadow is Gabriel's wing, that is, his left wing, while enlightened souls are
from his right wing. (Suhrawardl (b): 17-18, trans. Thackston)

As can be seen, the twofold nature of Gabriel is the core of this passage and the
two wings of the human archetype represent the spiritual and the material worlds:
light in Suhrawardl’s cosmology means being and darkness non-being. This is
clearly an example of elementaristic microcosmism in Allers’s division and re¬
sembles in many ways the analogy as it will be presented in the next subsection,
3.3.

In addition to bringing together two aspects of being, the passage implies that
the human archetype produces and works as a mediator in the creation of these
two aspects. It is said that “enlightened souls are from his right wing”, which ech¬
oes the mythological concept of the creation of the world from the primordial man
(see 1.2.1). Man as a divine plan according to which God creates the universe has
worked as an explanation for the existing analogy between man and the macro-

In al-Halveti’s translation of Hayakil an-nur, in the fourth temple, it is mentioned that “[t]his
is the soul of al-insan al-kamil, the perfect man, as man is meant to be, the microcosm of the
whole universe, who contains all that is in the universe” (Suhrawardl (f): 74). This passage,
which does not appear in OwjabT’s edition, clearly refers to the perfect man as the
microcosm.

80

cosm in various tradition, for instance, in Indo-Iranian mythology. 102 It would be
too much to say that SuhrawardI supported this idea of creation, but at least at the
level of language, this passage might imply that there were Iranian influences in
his microcosmism. In general, Iranian elements appear quite often in SuhrawardI’s
philosophical language - that could be seen, for instance, in his way of referring
to the human archetype as Ravan-Bakhsh.

There are traces of this ancient view elsewhere in Islamic philosophy as well.
TusI pronounces in his Rawda (134) that, being a microcosm (‘ alam-i saghTr),
man is a model (namudar) of the macrocosm (' alcim-i kabTr). Elsewhere in the
same work he explains:

The macrocosm from the circumference of the highest sphere to depths of the centre of
the Earth, is one individual who is called the Universal Man ( insdn-i kulli). Since the
sign of a mature person is the ability to procreate, when the macrocosm, which is the
Universal Man, reached complete maturity, what he produced as the like of himself
was the individual human being (insdn-i juzm), who in appearance is the macrocosm,
but in reality (ma no) is the macrocosm in the microcosm. (TusT: 44, trans. Badakh-
chani)

In this passage we can find a reference to the anthropomorphic universe which is,
at the same time, described as the universal man who is the prototype of the indi¬
vidual man. The ability to procreate is found in both the macrocosm and the mi¬
crocosm, and the emanation of the individual man from the universal man is par¬
alleled with it. At the end of the citation there is an interesting view concerning an
individual man as, on the one hand, the macrocosm and, on the other, the macro¬
cosm of the microcosm. Ambiguity concerning whether man is the microcosm or
the macrocosm occurs in the Jdbirian Corpus as well (see 4.1.1).

As can be seen, for the Ikhwan the human archetype was more loosely de¬
fined as the forefather of the human species, but in SuhrawardI’s Gabriel Platonic
philosophy is combined with earlier mythological concepts, which are employed
at least on the terminological level. Although microcosmism is seldom explicitly
linked with the human archetype, it is obviously attached to this aspect of humani¬
ty as well. In addition to elementaristic microcosmism appearing in other texts as
well, the human archetype in the Rasa 'il is connected with various other forms of

As Zaehner (1972: 112-113) points out, there are two archetypal humans in Iranian tradi¬
tions. Gayomart is the first human being and the father of the human race in all Zoroastrian
traditions. On the other hand, Zurvan is described as the primal man, the macrocosm and the
origin of the human being, the microcosm. In the Zoroastrian tradition, there is also a myth
of the primordial human prototype, who existed before the creation of the cosmos. The earth
is created from different parts of his body and finally the first man Gayomart is created from
his feet. (Zaehner 2002: 259) This is thought to originate in Indo-Iranian mythology and
gives one explanation for the microcosm-macrocosm analogy: the correspondence between
man and the universe is due to the fact that the universe was created from the human arche¬
type and the world is a copy of the human form.

81

the analogy, although their significance for the authors in this context is left rather
obscure and can be analysed more profoundly only in the light of then' microcos-
mism more generally.

3.3 MAN AS THE MIDDLE BEING

Microcosmism is often employed to define man’s location in cosmological sys¬
tems. It is common to treat the human being as the unifying level of creation,
which brings together the opposites in the universe. According to Allers (1944:
348), the elementaristic microcosm-macrocosm analogy emphasizes man as “the
centre of creation”, which is defined as this kind of the middle being. In this sub¬
section I will examine different views to the cosmological middle position of man
and their connection with the microcosm-macrocosm analogy.

3.3.1 The Twofold Nature of Man

The most common twofold division in man is that between the body and the soul.
Man as a psychophysical whole will, however, be treated in detail in Chapter 4.1
and only some aspects related to this will be examined in this chapter. One of
these is the idea of man as the intermediate level between the material world and
the spiritual world. This is elaborated especially by IbnArabT, who employs the
Quranic (23:100) term barzakh for the human being. As Chittick (1989: 14-15)
remarks, this is, however, not a unique feature of the human species, but every
being can be seen as an intermediate being between two levels of existence. At the
macrocosmic level, Ibn ‘ArabI uses barzakh to refer to the imaginative world,
which forms an intermediate level between the material and the spiritual worlds.
Man is barzakhT, because in him the spiritual soul and the material body are inte¬
grated. In the TadbTrdt, Ibn ‘ArabI (109) mentions the twofold nature of man in
the context of an explicit microcosm-macrocosm analogy: “Like in the world
there are things that are perceivable by the eye and hidden things, in the human
being there is the outer ( zdhir ) and the inner ( bdtin ): the sensible world and the
world of the heart, and the outer is the kingdom ( mulk ) and the inner is the sover¬
eignty {malakut). ,,m

The Ikhwan treat the middle position of the human being from various differ¬
ent perspectives at the beginning of the 28th epistle (R III: 20-22). The middle

Ibn Arabi often uses for the three worlds the quranical terms kingdom (mulk), sovereignty
(malakut) and domination (jabarut). In Ibn Arabl’s system, mulk, which as a word refers to
something concrete, stands for the material world, while malakut means the spiritual world.
Jabarut, on the other hand, refers to the intermediate world of the imagination. For more on
these concepts, see Chittick 1998: 259-260.

82

position ( mutawassita ) of man can be seen in his size: he is neither small nor big.
He is neither preceding in time other beings - like the four elements - nor suc¬
ceeding them - like the artefacts made by human hand. Among animals, he is nei¬
ther the strongest one, nor the weakest. The same is said to apply to his senses,
which are neither extremely efficient nor extremely weak. In the 31st epistle (R
III: 104), this middle position is even extended to the human voice: in the context
of different voices, it is explained that the human voice stands at the harmonic
middle position among all animal voices.

Among the most often treated aspects of man’s intermediate position is his
rank between the levels of the lowest and the highest of spiritual beings: angels
and devils. 104 According to the Ikhwan (R II: 473-475), as the middle being be¬
tween the material and the spiritual worlds, man is able to attain features of beings
located in the spiritual world - angels. At the same time, man carries a potential
for evil within him; the characteristics of jinnis and devils are also part of the soul
of the human being (R II: 457). 105 In order to achieve spiritual perfection, one
should conquer the lower features and actualize the angelic features latent in the
human soul, so that when the soul separates from the body in death, man may be¬
come either angel or devil. In their prologue to the 22nd epistle the authors sum¬
marize their position: “Man at his best, we shall show, is a noble angel, the finest
of creatures; but at his worst, an accursed devil, the bane of creation.” ( G: 4, trans.
Goodman and McGregor, in G: 65) 106

This topic is treated more profoundly by al-Ghazall. It is a key concept of his
ethics and, according to Taneli Kukkonen (2008: 211) “[t]his schizophrenic con¬
dition is painted in the starkest of terms in al-Ghazall’s writings; it motivates the
better part of his reflections on human psychology.” In all his (mystical) works,
man is presented as a two-faced being between the animal and the divine, and the
rank of the human being is one between that of beasts and angels (see, e.g., al-
Ghazall (a) 209 and (c): 701). In ' Ajd’ib al-qalb, it is explained that when it
comes to one’s innate disposition ifitra), the attraction of both bestial and angelic

Although the middle position of man is treated in much more detail in the Rasa il, it is worth
mentioning that, like for Ibn 'ArabI, other beings of the World of Generation and Corruption
also stand in the middle position between species. In addition to the contexts in which the
chain of beings is treated, this is mentioned, for instance, in the case of the plant soul which
is in the 21st epistle (R II: 158) said to be the middle being (al-mutawassita) between the
animal soul and the four elements. In the 46th epistle (R IV: 121), prophets are presented as
beings between men and angels.

Man as a potential angel and a potential devil is also treated in detail in the 46th epistle (R
IV: 105-123).

The middle position of man bringing together the spiritual and the material is also attached to
different kinds of knowledge (R II: 415). For more on this, see 5.3.3.2.

83

potentials is equal, and it is up to the human being himself in which direction he
leads his soul ((c): 718). 107

In the Hikma the middle position of the human being is shortly referred to
when the hierarchy inside the human species is clarified. According to SuhrawardI
((a): 112 ), some of the managing lights, meaning the souls of individuals - in this
case human individuals - are “nearly intellect while the lower of them are nearly
like those of the beasts” (trans. Walbridge and Ziai).

Sometimes the middle position is explained by the spiritual faculties of the
human being, a view which is present in al-Ghazall’s MTzdn al- amal as well ((a):
209 ) uis j|o s j s em phasized in Sirr al-khaliqa. In the Sirr (396-397, V 2.3), the
author declares that man is the link (wasl) between the intelligent and bestial be¬
ings, because in him there is the intellectual faculty ( at-tafakkur ) pertaining to
intelligent beings and, on the other hand, the faculties of beasts, which lack intel¬
lect. The faculties of man explain his middle position in the Sirr (403, V 3.2) also
when he is linked to other animals through his flesh, hair and blood, as well as
through his movements, desire, anger, senses and breath. The human being
shares 109 with minerals the fact that his body is corruptible and he is a mixture of
the four elements and with plants the fact that various faculties appear in both.
Man, however, also has knowledge and other intellectual faculties pertaining to
incorporeal beings: “For all this I say that the human being is between the intellec¬
tual and the sensible natures, and for this participates the whole nature” (403, V
3.2). In the fifth chapter (399, V 2.5), man is said to have four attributes: he is
living ( hayy ), meaning that he has a soul and senses; reflective ( mutafakkir ),
meaning that he does not pertain to beasts; mortal, meaning that he does not per¬
tain to the eternal ones; and he seeks knowledge, which distinguishes him from
the jinn, whose knowledge is not based on learning.

The author of the Sirr also approaches the middle position of the human spe¬
cies between existence and non-existence from a quite exceptional perspective,
that of alimentation. In the ontology of the work, the Aristotelian concepts of
movement ( al-haraka ) and immobility ( as-sukun ) are often used in reference to

This two-faced nature of the human being in the theory of knowledge will be treated in
Chapter 5.3.3.2.

For more on the faculties of man, see 5.1.2.1.

The verb used is shdraka. Allers (1944: 346-347) compares St. Gregory’s and Yosef Ibn
Saddiq’s passages treating this form of elementaristic microcosmism and states: “It seems
probable that both St. Gregory and the Rabbi [i.e. Yosef ibn Saddiq] got their formula from
one selfsame source. This original statement must have contained the expression that man
‘possesses’, or ‘shares’, 'participates in’, the natures of infra- and suprahuman beings -
although the latter remark might be an addition by some Christian author. This source is
probably Poseidonios.” (347)

84

existence or life and non-existence or death (e.g., 445, VI 6.1). 110 In the sixth
chapter of the Sirr (455-456, VI 9.1-9.3), the different diets of beings are ex¬
plained and it is said that, for the sake of balance, it would be impossible for all
animals to be carnivores or for all to be herbivores. This is explained by their on¬
tological positions. Animals that have more movement in them than immobility
eat meat and the ones that have more immobility and are, in that way, closer to
plants, do not eat meat. Eating meat is also connected with activity and masculini¬
ty, while eating herbs is considered to be passive and feminine. The human being,
being a combination ( murakkab ) of movement and immobility, eats both plants
and animals. The fact that man is omnivorous has to do with the balance of the
universe as a whole: “If man was only to eat bread and not meat and varied things,
he would never complete sowing and spheres would be demolished, and all things
would perish and vanish” (456).

As can be seen from these examples, the middle position of man can be un¬
derstood in various ways: as an actual ontological position of all men or as an eth¬
ical concept regarding human perfection. In the Sirr, the emphasis is more clearly
on describing different aspects of humanity, and, though the angelic or rational is
interpreted as the higher aspect in man, the focus is clearly on ontology instead of
ethics. When the intermediate position is understood in the way of al-Ghazall, the
ethical dimension is obvious. For him the specific, innate all-encompassing nature
is something that an individual man should leave behind to become angelic in his
perfection. The Ikhwan seem to stand somewhere in between these views.

3.3.2 Between Light and Darkness

The relationship between existence and non-existence, which Neoplatonic ontolo¬
gy equates with the relationship between the spiritual and the material, is in many
texts explained by the light metaphor. Usually light stands for pure existence
while darkness symbolizes non-existence. I will examine some general features of
the light metaphor and scrutinize the ways this allegorical language is used in the
descriptions of man as the microcosm. In this chapter, the light metaphor will be
examined only when it is related to the cosmological middle position of the hu¬
man being. 111

Movement is associated with generation, spiritual beings and life ( al-hayat ), while
immobility is related to material beings and death (al-mawt). Just as the spirit moves
upwards, so is the nature of movement to rise upwards, which is also the reason why the
spheres have their circular movement. (Sirr. 445, VI 6.1)

The light metaphor appears in the context of the microcosmic idea also when the human
faculties - or the human intellect in particular - are described as light or lights. This will be
examined in 5.1.2.2.

85

The light metaphor occurs often in the Rasa il. It is used in descriptions of the
cosmological system, where being or existence is equated with light. Baffioni
(2008b) notes that the light metaphor is used in several ways in representations of
the cosmological system in the Rasa’il. 112 Al-Ghazall’s Mishkdt is constructed in
the form of a commentary to the Light Verse of the Qur’an (24:35), and the light
metaphor is an essential topic in the work. Even if the light metaphor was in regu¬
lar use in the earlier traditions as well, the one who developed it most extensively
in the Islamic tradition, taking it as the key to his whole philosophy, was
Suhrawardl. 113 In addition to these quite obvious examples of the use of the light
metaphor, references to it appear in other texts as well. In the Sirr. for instance,
the dualism of movement and immobility is connected with the light metaphor,
and life is also referred to as light: “The life and the light are one thing: if there is
no life in something, there is no light in it, and if there is movement in something,
there is life in it, and if there is life in something, there is light in if’ (454, VI
8.4). 114

As was seen above (3.2), in SuhrawardT’s thought the middle position of the
human being is explained by the light metaphor. In Avdz-i parr-i Jibrd’Tl,
Suhrawardl ((b): 17) describes the human archetype Gabriel as the middle being
between the spiritual and the material worlds, explaining that Gabriel has two
wings, the right one representing light and the left one representing darkness. In
SuhrawardT’s case, however, the idea of man as a microcosm is seldom explained
through the light metaphor.

When it comes to the microcosmic epistles of the Rasa 'il, the Ikhwan use the
metaphor of light to explain the relationship between the soul and the intellect:

On the other hand, the relationship of the Soul to the Intellect is like the relationship
between the shining (daw ’) of the moon to the light of the sun. The relationship of the
Intellect to the Creator is like that of the sunlight to the sun itself. When the moon is
filled with the light of the sun, its light resembles that of the sun. In a similar manner,

Baffioni (2008b) indicates the occurrence of the metaphor, for instance, in descriptions of the
emanation from the Universal Intellect (e.g., R III: 196-197); in explanations of the
dependence of the existence on the Creator: if the lamp ceased to burn, light would not exist
either (e.g., R III: 337); and in the relationship of individual souls to the Universal Soul (e.g.,
R III: 342). As Baffioni points out, the light metaphor is used in the Rasd’il also in
epistemological contexts, or, as she puts it, in “gnosiology”. She affirms that in this form the
metaphor often occurs in connection with, or even interchangeably with its ontological use.

According to Walbridge (2001: 59), the dualism of light and darkness is one of the few
influences that Suhrawardl himself points out to be of Persian origin. Baffioni (2008b: 175)
leaves it open whether the Ikhwan may be seen to anticipate the use of the light metaphor in
the IshraqI school.

The Ikhwan, too, equate movement with light and explain the governance of movement to
the moving body with that of light to the enlightened (R 11: 16).

86

when the Soul receives emanation from the Intellect, its virtues are completed and its

acts resemble those of the Intellect. (R II: 462)' 15

The relationship of the intellect to the soul is elsewhere described to be like that of
light to the eye (R II: 416). Except for these kinds of references, the cosmological
light metaphor does not seem essential for the authors of the Rasa 'il in the context
of the microcosm-macrocosm analogy.

Ibn 'Arab!, however, uses the light metaphor to refer to the twofold nature of
man more extensively than the authors we have discussed up till now. In the first
chapter of the TadbTrdt (126-127), he refers to it briefly mentioning that in Sufism
the body of a human being is often regarded as a place of darkness. God is the
Light resembling the sun, but, in addition to this highest light, he adds, there are
other lights which are the perfect men. They are like other suns, and they may as
well transmit light to the dark bodies. Elsewhere in the same work Ibn ArabI em¬
ploys the cosmological light metaphor and explicitly describes man as the middle
being. In the eighth chapter on physiognomy he says that the human spirit ( ar-ruh
al-insdni) has one face towards light and another towards darkness. The essence
of the human spirit is to be a mediator ( mutawassita ) between light, which is the
intellect, and darkness, which is matter. This is due to it being created, like the
Universal Soul ( an-nafs al-kulliyya), to manage a material body. In some people
one of these two - light or darkness - dominates. The ideal state for a man is the
balance of the two and, when it is achieved, it can also be seen in the physical
appearance of a man in the harmonious proportions of his body. (Ibn ‘ArabI: 168—
169) n< ’ This is exceptional, because it indicates that Ibn ‘ArabI actually sees the
middle position not primarily as an innate feature of the human species, but as
something ideal that should be sought after.

The light metaphor, though important in the texts, is an ontological theme on¬
ly loosely related to microcosmism. It appears at times linked with the micro¬
cosm-macrocosm analogy, but is seldom elaborated, even if it obviously is - as
can be seen in Ibn ArabT’s TadbTrdt - connected with the topic of man as the mid¬
dle being and, hence, with the elementaristic microcosmism.

3.4 MAN EPITOMIZING SPECIES

Microcosmism is also present when the role of the human being among sublunar
beings is examined. This subsection will continue with the theme of the middle

115

116

This passage can be examined as an implicit occurrence of the Platonic mirror metaphor as
well. See de Callatay 2005a: 195-196.

Ibn ‘ArabI’s physiognomic views and their relationship with microcosmism will be examined
in 4.3.2.

87

position of man, but now the focus will be on the realms of the muwalladdt : min¬
erals, plants and animals. One dimension of this position is idea of the human be¬
ing epitomizing other realms of the sublunar world. The topic will be treated from
the perspective of the specific characteristics of the animal species. In Allers’s
classification, this is presented as a variation of elementaristic microcosmism.
Before proceeding to the topic, it is necessary to briefly consider some general
attitudes of the authors towards other realms of beings, especially that of the hay-
awan, which will also clarify their views to be presented later.

3.4.1 Plants - Animals - Man

In all the studied texts, man is described as the vicegerent of God khalifat alldh
(e.g., Q. 2:30) on earth, and, for this, seen to reign over other realms and species
dwelling on the earth (see, e.g., R I: 306). As the ruler of all species he is different
from the other hayawan. The Ikhwan keep repeating that man is the most perfect
(i akmal ) being, because he epitomizes all the ka 'indt under the sphere of the Moon
(e.g., R II: 476).

Especially in the 34th epistle (R III: 223-226) it can be seen that the chain of
being and the continuity between species is an important aspect in the cosmology
of the Ikhwan. The first species is close to the second species and the second to
the third and so forth, and the similarities between species are emphasized. There
is an order and hierarchy between beings in the World of Generation and Corrup¬
tion, which is like that of numbers or heavenly bodies. The lowest minerals are
close to dust ( turdb ) and the highest ones to the lowest of the plants - that is to
say, to truffles and mushrooms. The highest plant, on the other hand, is the date-
palm, which is close to animals. 117 Instead of concentrating on physical features,
in which the ape is closest to man, often the elephant or the horse is described as
the animal next to man due to their spiritual abilities. Often in the Rasa il the hu¬
man being is considered to be one of the hayawan and man is seen as the highest
of the animals. Here the Ikhwan, however, define the human species as its own
realm: “The highest plant is related to the animals, the highest animal to the hu¬
man being, and the highest human being to the angels.” 118

A similar hierarchy of species is common in Islamic mediaeval thought and,
for example, SuhrawardI ((a): 111), speaking of the hierarchy of the dominating

The similarity between man and the palm tree is also examined in Stir al-khallqa (319, IV
3.2) and, as Hameen-Anttila (2006: 131) points out, it also occurs in Ibn Wahshiyya’s (d.
930/931) al-Filaha an-nabatiyya.

Although the sublunar realms are usually said to be three in number, the class of human
beings is actually quite often defined as its own realm in the Rasa'il , as, e.g., in the 21st
epistle, where the chain of being is treated in detail (R II: 167-171).

lights, writes: “Some minerals, like the coral, closely approach the position (hai ’a)
of plants; and some plants, like the date-palm, closely approach the position of
animals. Some animals, such as the ape, approach the human being in the perfec¬
tion of their inner faculties and in other respects.” 119

The general attitude of the Ikhwan towards animals is surprisingly positive for
their time, especially in the 22nd epistle. 120 Differences between animal species
are explained by the number of faculties each of them has: just as different animal
species have different numbers of senses, there are various ranks among men ac¬
cording to their ability to acquire knowledge (R IV: 121). In the epistle on music,
the hierarchy among animals is related to the faculty of speech (al-quwwa an-
ndtiqa). Producing sounds is defined as the ability separating “dumb” animals
from others: “With regard to dumb animals, such as fish, crabs, turtles and others,
they are dumb because they have neither lungs nor wings 1 ” 1 and so produce no
sounds” (W: 32, trans. Wright, in W\ 91).

In addition to speech, conscious perception ( tamylz ) and intellectual faculty,
which are defined as faculties distinguishing man from animals (e.g., R III: 132), a
unique feature of the human being is his upright posture: plants have their “head”
towards the centre of the earth, animals are somewhere in the middle, but the hu¬
man being stands with his head towards the heavens (see, e.g., G: 8). 122 In the Sirr
(424—425, VI 1.2), this is explained by the harmony of elements found in the hu¬
man being. Man is directed upwards, resembling the nature of the air, but is heavy
because of the element of earth within him. In animals, the four elements can be
found in unequal quantities, which explains, for instance, differences between the
ways they move. Later (446, VI 6.2), it is explained that quadrupeds have too little
ah in them, while the human being as a biped is perfectly balanced in this respect.
Buds, on the other hand, fly, because they are deficient in the element of earth.

This topic is interesting from the perspective of the Platonic forms examined in the context
of the human archetype (see 3.2.2). Since SuhrawardI is clear in his views concerning the
essential differences between species, this passage can, in his case, be seen as a mere
description of similarities between the species and it does not have any evolutionistic
connotations which have been read into similar contexts in the Rasa 'il (see Goodman 2009:
24-28).

The Ikhwan’s view on animals is set forth in epistle twenty-two. Although it is influenced by
Aristotelian views, the epistle differs significantly from these because "the whole subject is
placed within a well-known "ontological” dispute” (Baffioni (2008a: 197). I have elsewhere
noted (Nokso-Koivisto 2011b) that despite the other layers of the epistle, its primary concern
is to define the position and perfection of a human being.

The Ikhwan parallel the buzzing produced by the wings of an insect with the other sounds
produced by animals.

De Smet (2010: 78) indicates that the Platonic idea of the human being as “a celestial plant”,
which is like an inverted tree standing with his roots towards the heavens appears in al-
Mas'udl’s Muruj adh-dhahab, where it is attributed to the Sabians of Harran.

89

In the Kitcib ar-rahma (138-139), the author examines differences between
human and animal souls and concludes that only a human soul may enter the hu¬
man body, because it is different from the other animal souls in that it does not
perish and is the only one able to receive spiritual lights. Animal souls are inferior
and condemned to the sublunar world. Another major difference is the ability of
speech: “The spirit of the speaking animal ( nih al-hayawan an-ndtiq ) is different
from the spirit of the silent animal (ruh al-hayawan as-sdmit ) and, for the differ¬
ence between the two spirits and the two bodies in their combination, the one does
not enter the body of the other” (139).

In the chapter On the Level of Humanity and that it Resembles the Macrocosm
of the Ghdya , the noble position of man among animals is explained by his vari¬
ous skills. Man is able to produce all the sounds of the animals, make pictures of
all of them and describe them with his tongue: “A cock does not crow, a dog does
not bark or a lion roar, but in a way that man is able to imitate, changing his voice
and characteristics” {Ghdya: 43).

It appears logical that in the hierarchical chain of beings the higher beings in¬
clude the characteristics of the lower ones. Usually, when the human being is ex¬
amined as a part of the chain of beings, the distinctive characteristic between man
and (other) animal species is defined as the faculty of speech, not the intellectual
faculty, which, as will be seen in 4.1.1, works as the defining feature of man in
general definitions of the human being.

3.4.2 Animal Characteristic in Man

In the Rasa 'il, each realm of the sublunar world is said to have its special charac¬
teristics {khdssiyya). In the 26th epistle, the Ikhwan say that all these characteris¬
tics can be found in man:

The human being shares with all these species*" 3 their special features. Hence, he has
four natures which are liable to transmutation ( istihala ) and change like the four ele¬
ments. He partakes in generation and corruption like the minerals. He takes nourish¬
ment and grows like plants, senses and moves like animals and may reach immortality
like angels. (R II: 473)

The appearance of generic features of other classes of beings in a summarized
form in the human being is regarded as a variation of the elementaristic micro-
cosmism by Allers (1944: 344-345). In addition to these generic characteristics,
each individual animal species has its own specific characteristics. Another, more

The Ikhwan uses the term species (anwa '), although they refer to the realms of the species.
Often in their definitions of the hierarchy of souls (e.g., 34th epistle) naw ' refers to separate
species, while jins is used of the realms of plants and animals.

90

specific form of this elementaristic analogy, 124 assumes the appearance of these
characteristics in the human being.

In the 34th epistle, the Ikhwan (R III: 224-229) say that in the continuous
chain of being each being always has something in common with the previous and
the following ones in the chain. They list various animals which share features
with the human being, the ape for its physical shape, the elephant for its wisdom,
the horse for its noble character, and so on. Finally, they affirm that there is no
animal, which would not share something with the human being. A more detailed
exposition of this can be found in the 26th epistle On the Saying of the Wise that
the Human Being is a Microcosm (R II: 474-475), which connects this topic to
microcosmism:

Regarding man sharing the special characteristics of all beings, you should know, oh
brother, may God help you and us with a spirit from him, that each animal species has
its special characteristic, which is innate to it. All of these characteristics can be found
in the human-being: man is " brave like a lion, cowardly like a rabbit, generous like a
cock, niggardly like a dog, chaste like a fish, boastful like a raven... (R II: 474)

The long list continues with dozens of animals and their special features. It is
mostly constructed of opposite pairs: the whale is mute while the nightingale is
talkative. The fox is malicious while the sheep is gentle. In this way, the Ikhwan
classify animals into two categories: those defined by positive attributes in oppo¬
sition to others which are lazy, savage and in many other ways obnoxious. The
description of the human being as a microcosm of animal features - both in good
and bad - draws a contradictory image of man. Sharing all these features, man has
the potential to be everything, possesing extremely negative features as well as
positive ones. The characteristics of animals are expressed in binary pairs and, in
the animal realm as a whole, positive features seem to compensate for negative
ones.

The special innate characteristics of the animal species are also described in
the epistle On Magic (C: 53-54). All of them are claimed to occur in man, but to
appear in him in a less strong and obvious manner than in animals. In this context,
the attitude of the Ikhwan towards these animal characteristics seems quite neu¬
tral. In the 46th epistle (R IV: 116), on the other hand, the Ikhwan explain that the
human is the middle being and lists animals which are close to him: the parrot can

Alters (1944: 346-347) notes that man is considered to be a sum of animal characteristics in,
for instance, the texts of Yosef ibn Saddiq, and Allers names the Ikhwan as a possible source
for him. Like ibn Saddiq, the Ikhwan say that man shares ( sharaka ) these characteristics with
animals. On the use of this verb, see note 109.

An essential point regarding the meaning of this kind of microcosmism is whether this is
translated as above or as “man may be brave like a lion, cowardly like a rabbit”, etc. Both
translations are equally possible.

91

imitate his words and voices and the camel or the donkey can serve him, and so

on. In this context, mainly positive human-like features are related to certain ani-

, 126

mals.

The idea that man is a microcosm of animal features occurs in many other
texts of the corpus as well. In the Sirr (430, VI 2.5), it is simply stated that be¬
cause the human being participates in all elements, he also participates in all ani¬
mal species and that all things are present in the human being. In the TadbTrdt
(109), Ibn'ArabI refers to the similar view in a slightly different way and parallels
the earthly desires of the human being to animals and devils in the outside world:
“Like in the world there are predatory animals, satans and cattle ( bahd'im ), so in
the human being is there killing and a desire of vanquishing, victory, anger, ha¬
tred, envy, lecherous life, eating, drinking, copulating and (earthly) pleasure.”

Al-Ghazall explains the same topic in more detail and, like Ibn ‘Arab!, links it
with the evil side of man. In ' Ajd’ib al-qalb, al-Ghazall ((c): 701) remarks that the
horse shares certain things with the donkey, but differs from it in its own special
characteristics which are more noble than those of the donkey, and those special
characteristics are the ones for which it was created. Likewise, the human being
shares certain things with the horse and the donkey, but was created for other pur¬
poses, which are angelic. In his work on ethics, the MTzdn al- 'amal ((a): 210), al-
Ghazall says that “the one who turns his interest into pursuing corporeal pleasures
eating like cattle, has descended to the sphere of the beasts. He either becomes
ignorant as an ox, or greedy as a pig, or mad as a dog, or spiteful as a camel, or
haughty as a leopard, or sly as a fox, or combines all these like a rebellious satan.”

A view similar to that of the MTzdn can be found in al-QazwInl’s 'Ajd’ib al-
makhluqat. There it is stated that man is the microcosm, for the human body is
like a residence for the court of the kingdom, which is constituted of the spiritual
faculties of man. On the other hand, since man eats and sleeps, he is called a plant.
From the point of view of his senses and his ability to move, he is called an ani¬
mal. However, according to al-QazwInl, the fact that he knows the realities of
things, he is called a king. Including all this, man can, nevertheless, lean towards
his animal side and be “raging like a lion, or gluttonous like cattle, or greedy like
a pig, or humble like a dog, or spitefi.il like a camel, or lecherous like a buck, or
haughty like a leopard, or sly like a fox. Or, if he summarizes all these attributes,
he is a rebellious satan.” (al-QazwInl (a): 303) In these examples from Ibn 'ArabI,
al-Ghazall and al-QazwInl, the animal side of the human being is clearly seen as a
feature that tilts man towards the devil.

If above (3.4.1, R IV: 121) the differences between animal species were related to the various
abilities of men to achieve knowledge, in this context differences between animal species are
related to different abilities of human individuals to receive revelation.

92

If in the previous example from the Rasa il. the appearance of animal charac¬
teristics in man is regarded as a neutral or even as a positive thing, the Ikhwan are
not always consistent in this topic. In the 34th epistle, they present the idea in a
form similar to those of al-Ghazall and al-QazwInl, and the bestial in the human
being is clearly seen as a negative feature. The lowest of the human beings are
bound to the mundane and, like apes, they are human solely in their bodily aspect.
They only acquire knowledge about the material world through the senses:

Like beasts, such people desire pleasure only from eating and drinking. Like pigs or
donkeys, they only aim at contenting themselves in sexual intercourse or cohabitation,
and they only strive to collect treasures, the goods of earthly life. Like ants, they amass
things they do not need. Like magpies, they hoard what is not useful to them. Like pea¬
cocks, they care for no other decoration than a colourful appearance. They fight for
mammon like dogs over a corpse. Their form may be human, but the deeds of their
souls are those of animal and vegetative souls. (R III: 229)

Man as an all-encompassing being bringing together all the animal characteristics
seems to have two different aspects for the authors of the Rasa ’il. On the one
hand, this is a neutral or even positive feature and emphasizes the abilities of ani¬
mals. This is exceptional in the mediaeval anthropocentric worldview. On the oth¬
er hand, like Ibn 'Arab!, al-Ghazall and al-QazwInl, the Ikhwan in their 34th epis¬
tle see this as something clearly negative attaching it to the diabolic side of man.
These views approach the question from two different positions. In the former
one, the main aim is to declare the actual 121 position of the human being among
the creation, while the latter aims at describing his potential development. The
animal side of man, the lower part of the human soul or nafs bahmiyya is similar
to an individual animal, such as a dog or a donkey, and should be defeated. Even
if, as is usually emphasized, the middle position is an innate feature of man, in the
ideal situation the animal side should be conquered by the angelic.

The Ikhwan reserve a whole subsection for this topic in their Epistle On the
Saying of the Wise that the Human Being is a Microcosm. Other authors, too, treat
it as being connected with the idea of the human being as the microcosm. For this,
it can be seen as an essential form of the analogy, in which the human being epit¬
omizes a collective of other beings - in this case forms a microcosm of one sublu¬
nar realm, the animals. Although it appears in Allers’s systematization as well, it
is exceptional among the occurrences of the microcosm-macrocosm analogy in
respect to the macrocosm. Usually the macrocosm is formed by another, higher

If the first passage of the Rasd’il is read in the manner pointed out in note 125, the
interpretation of the passage would naturally change in this respect too: this positive or
neutral microcosm of animal characteristics might appear in man potentially. The difference
between these passages would, however, stay the same, the first being either a declaration of
the existing state or a possibility in man, and the second an ethical claim of how things
should be.

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level of reality or by a whole which is easily definable as its own entity. In this
case, however, a whole class of beings and their characteristic features form a
level parallel to that of the human being.

A passage appearing at the end of the 22nd epistle of the Rasa ’il could be in¬
terpreted as a variation of this form of microcosmism, with the distinction that the
macrocosm is formed by the collective of human beings. After saying that no spe¬
cies can contain all the virtues, the Ikhwan provide a description of the perfect
human being in which the virtues of each nation are brought together:

He was a Persian by breeding, Arabian by faith, a hamf by confession, Iraqi in culture,
Hebrew in lore, Christian in manner, Damascene in devotion, Greek in science, Indian
in discernment, Sufi in intimations, regal in character, masterful in thought, divine in
awareness. (G: 278, trans. Goodman and McGregor, in G: 313-314)

In this way the human being and, particularly, the perfect man is presented as a
microcosm of humanity. 128

When the human being is approached as a microcosm of different species, the
focus is clearly on the description of the specific nature of the human being. In
many forms of the idea of man epitomizing animal species and especially in the
last example of the microcosm of humanity, microcosmism is also connected with
human perfection. This is done in two distinct ways. On the one hand, it is ex¬
pressed that one should get rid of his animal characteristics. This resembles the
more general notion of man as the middle being between devil and angel and is
often elaborated in these contexts. On the other hand, the microcosmic position is
related to the perfect man and in order to achieve perfection one must combine the
best characteristics of different animals or, as in the last example, nations.

Although the Ikhwan are not explicit in this, this may well refer to the Prophet or the Imam:
elsewhere in the Rasa'il some particular prophets (R III: 496) or the Imam (R IV: 125) are
described as individuals who bring together all the properties ( khisal) of men. This topic is
also treated in the context of the human archetype, see 3.2.1.

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4. PHYSIOLOGICAL ASPECT OF MICROCOSMISM

“The Creator, may he be praised, created the human being in the fairest stature (JT
ahsani taqwTm) and shaped him in the most perfect form and made his form the
mirror for his soul, to show in it the picture of the Large World” (R II: 462). 129
The Ikhwan, as well as many other authors. 1,0 describe the human body as the
most perfect of the material bodies, following in this the Qur anic idea that the
human being was created in the fairest stature (Q. 95:4). In the passage cited
above, the human body is also described as the mirror for the soul, due to which it
forms a picture of the whole world, a microcosm.

No strict difference between the physical and spiritual aspects of the micro¬
cosm-macrocosm analogy can be recognized in the study corpus. In this chapter,
however, I will concentrate on the physiological aspect of the idea and consider
the attitudes towards the human body. The primary questions are: what does the
microcosm-macrocosm analogy reveal concerning the concept of corporeality in
mediaeval Islamic thought and how are the attitudes towards the human body ex¬
pressed in these contexts? On the other hand, how is microcosmism employed in
the description of the human body? The topics relevant from these perspectives
are, naturally, those approaching the physiological aspect of the human being and
the dichotomy between the material and the spiritual in man, but also the contexts
- like alchemical theory - which place their primary interest in the physical di¬
mension of reality, although the focus of the theory concerning the human being
were on him as a psychophysical whole.

Firstly, I will examine the concept of corporeality in relation to the human
soul or the spiritual in man. This is a crucial topic concerning the whole physio¬
logical microcosmic idea and will, after this overview, be present also in the sec¬
ond subchapter in which the focus will be on the explicit physiological compari¬
sons. Thirdly, I will turn to the mediaeval scientific worldview. The examination
will be divided into four parts: theories related to astronomy, physiognomy, al¬
chemy and music therapy. My aim is, on the one hand, to examine interpretations
of microcosmism as a part of the theories in these fields and, on the other hand, to
observe the importance of these disciplines in the texts in order to define the role

As can be seen, in this passage, the Platonic mirror metaphor appears in explicit form, see de
Callatay 2005a: 196 and Chapter 5.3.

For instance, SuhrawardI ((a): 141): “The human fortress was created perfect, and all the acts
arise from it” (trans. Walbridge and Ziai) and SuhrawardI ((a): 142) “the most noble
construction belongs to the human fortress” (trans. Walbridge and Ziai), and Ibn 'ArabI: 125.

95

given to the analogy in them. Through these scientific theories some elements of
the explicit comparisons also become more lucid.

4.1 THE BODY - A PRISON OR A MOUNT?

Although the microcosmic idea in some of its forms concentrates on the human
soul and in some other contexts the emphasis is on the physiological aspect of
man, it accentuates the nature of the human being as a psychophysical entity. For
this, the relationship between the spiritual and the corporeal is a topic related to
microcosmism in many ways. It was touched upon in the previous chapter when
the middle position of the human being among other creatures and as a part of the
cosmological system was examined, and it will be relevant in Chapter 5 in the
context of spiritual human perfection. In this chapter, the twofold nature of man as
regards his body and soul will be examined. I will, firstly, examine microcosmism
in the definition of the human being and then turn to the way the body-soul rela¬
tionship is treated.

4.1.1 Microcosmism and Definition of Man

An important question concerning the position of the human being as a micro¬
cosm is what is meant by the human being: is the essence of humanity seen as
spiritual or corporeal or as a combination of these two? According to the Ikhwan
(R II: 59 and III: 248) 131 , a human being is a human being on account of his spir¬
itual aspect, not his physical qualities. Rationality and logic distinguish the human
being from other animals, and, in the tenth epistle on logic ( B: 10), the human
being is defined as “living, rational and mortal, whereas other animals are living
and mortal, but not rational”. 132 In these contexts, it seems clear that for the
Ikhwan the primary defining characteristic of the human being pertains to the
sphere of the spiritual: what distinguishes the human being from other beings is

131

The authenticity of these two passages has recently been questioned by Hamdani. In both
passages the Ikhwan quote a verse: "Strive in your soul and (try) to perfect its qualities for
you are a human being by soul and not by body” (trans. Hamdani 2008: 93). The verse has
been identified to derive from Abu 1-Fath al-Bustl, and, interestingly Hamdani (2008: 93)
points out that, although it appears in all three printed editions of the Rasa’il, it is omitted
from the oldest known manuscript of the work the Istanbul manuscript (dated 1182) as well
as from the Tehran manuscript (1287). Hamdani presents this as a proof for the theory of the
early composition of the Rasa 'il and considers this along with some other passages as later
interpolations to the text.

132 .

This definition can he found elsewhere in the Rasa ’il as well, see, e.g., R 1: 263 and III: 397.
Baffioni (B: 65 n. 1) shows that this definition is from Isagoge, and originates from the
Pythagorean definition of gods as immortal, rational animals and human beings as mortal,
rational animals. For its later development in Stoicism, see DeDurand 1973.

96

the intellectual faculty or, more generally, the spiritual in the human being. Even
so, later in the epistle on logic ( B : 10), the authors remark: “In fact, the language
and life of a man occurs on behalf of the soul, while his death occurs on behalf of
the body, as the name ‘man’ ( insdn ) is proper to the soul as well as to the body”
(trans. Baffioni, in B : 67). The Ikhwan (B: 39) also state that the human being is in
need of logic because of his attachment to the body. If he were not, both language
and logic would be unnecessary, since spiritual beings perceive things directly
without these conceptual systems. Hence, logic and rationality would actually be
useless without the twofold nature of man. What separates man from the animals
is rationality which, at the same time, opens a window to the higher reality. Mor¬
tality, however, always keeps the human being separated from purely intellectual
beings. It seems that, according to the Ikhwan, what really makes man a man is
his body and soul together.

The way the Ikhwan scrutinize microcosmism in their writings shows that it is
an essential feature in their definition of man. It is pointed out several times in the
Rasa’il that the human being is a combination of the corporeal and the spiritual
(e.g., R I: 259 and IV: 83). At the beginning of the 26th epistle, the human being
is described as a microcosm, because in him the two dimensions of reality are
brought together:

Since man is a combination of the corporeal body and spiritual soul, the first philoso¬
phers found in the structure of his body correspondences to all beings that are in the
sensible world, from the wonders of the compositions of the spheres, parts of the zodi¬
ac, movements of the heavenly bodies, compositions of the four elements (arkan wa
ummahat), the variety of the minerals and the diversity of the forms of the plants to the
marvels of the structures of the animals. They also found in the human soul and in the
flowing of its faculties in the structure of the body correspondences to the spiritual
creatures: angels, jinns, people, satans and the souls of all animals and the changes of
their states in the world. (R II: 457)

Man includes both aspects of the created universe, while other beings may include
only some spiritual aspects or are constituted of pure spiritual substance, like the
angels. In the 32nd epistle On the Opinion of the Pythagoreans regarding the
Origin of the Intellectual Beings ( R III: 188), there is, as well, an explicit refer¬
ence to the human being as a microcosm and to the world as a large man, because
in the structure of the human being (tarkib al-insdn ) meanings of all beings can be
found. This, on the other hand, is due to man being a combination of the viscous
(ghalTz ) material body and the simple ( basit ) spiritual soul.

We can see that the Ikhwan’s definition of the human being is in many ways
connected to the twofold nature of humanity, which is defined by Allers (1944:
321) as the “simplest form of microcosmism”, the elementaristic analogy (see
1.3.2), and they also link this aspect of the idea to the term ‘d/am saghTr.

97

Some other texts of this study attach the twofold nature more explicitly to the
definition of the human being. In Sirr al-khalTqa (427, VI 2.3), combining the
spiritual and the material is given as an essential feature of humanity. It is said
that, “what makes the human being eternal ( khdUd) is that he is from the living
spirit (ruh al-hayat), that is to say that the human being is a combination of two
opponents differing from each other: matter and spirit.” The body is said to re¬
semble the four elements while the soul resembles the active movement (haraka).
Later (431-432, VI 2.6) it is added, however, that the human being is different
from all other beings because of his innate intellectual faculty (quwwat al-'aql).
This spiritual aspect of man is also the balancing force in the twofold human be¬
ing. The rational life is the middle stage between the drop ( an-nutfa) ui and the
earth ( at-turdb ). The first stage of the human being is the immobile drop and the
last the immobile earth. In the middle, however, there is growth and life. The pas¬
sage continues: “it is because in the middle of his course he is called living and
the human being, and also because in him the two aspects come together and are
balanced through the spirit of the speaking (or rational) life (nlh al-hayat an-
ndtiqa) (434, VI 2.7).” It is also noted that all things are present in the human be¬
ing and that the human being is the microcosm ( al- ‘dlam as-saghTr ) - “saghlr”
because he needs the world and is confined to it (431^132, VI 2.6).

In al-QazwInfs Ajd ’ib, the chapter on the reality of the human being starts in
the following way:

Know that the human being is the highest of animals and the best part of the creation.

God, the Sublime, composed his wondrous construction in the best possible form,
which consists of different things and various humours. God divided his substance into
spirit and body and gave him the special characteristics of understanding (fahm) and
reason (’aql). (al-QazwIm (a): 302)'~ 4

A little later in the same passage, man is described as a microcosm and in this
context the term dlam saghlr - which rarely appears in the work - is mentioned.

Thus, in both the Sirr and the 'Ajd 'ib, the human being as a microcosm - in
this context referring to his nature as a combination of the spiritual and the mate¬
rial or the microcosmic position more generally - is an essential element in the
definition of man.

This refers to the astrological embryology, see 4.3.1.1.

There are some differences between Wiistenfeld’s edition and the Beirut edition in this
passage. In the latter the body-soul division is even more emphasized: “Know that the human
being is an entity composed of the soul and the body, and that he is the highest of animals
and the best part of the creation. God, the Sublime, composed him in the best possible form
of spirit and of matter and he was given the special characteristics of speech (nutq) and
reason ('aql)y (al-QazwInl (b): 251) Another difference between the editions is the first
special characteristic, understanding, which is in the Beirut edition replaced by speech.

98

In the Jabirian Corpus, there is an interesting passage concerning the twofold
nature of man and microcosmism. In the Kitdb ustuqus al-uss al-awwal (62), the
author clarifies the position of man with two microcosmic references. It is re¬
marked, firstly, that God made the human being a microcosm for his bodily as¬
pect, which brings together the four natures appearing in the created world. Sec¬
ondly, that he made man a macrocosm (sic) for his intellect (' aql). 135 This could
be read to affirm that the human being is a microcosm for both his spiritual and
corporeal aspects. Then the way to call the intellect a macrocosm would simply
emphasize its nobility in relation to the body. On the other hand, the passage
could also be seen as a reference to the microcosm-macrocosm analogy in the
human being: the body is the lower and “microcosmic” appearance of the higher
macrocosm, the human intellect.

The psychophysical whole the microcosmic man forms is not absent in our
Sufi texts either, but it is not in the core of their definitions of the human being. In
al-Ghazalfs writings, the emphasis is much more clearly on the spiritual aspect of
man. The special characteristic of the human being is mentioned several times to
be knowledge ( Him), wisdom ( hikma ) or, more specifically, “gnosis (ma 'rifd) of
the real essences of things”. For nourishment and the ability to reproduce he is a
plant, for senses and ability to move himself voluntarily he is an animal, and when
it comes to his physical form and standing posture, he is like a wall relief. Finally,
however, it is knowledge which distinguishes him from the other creatures, (al-
Ghazall (c): 701) Elsewhere, the real essence of humanity is at times defined to be
the heart and, at times, the soul. 16 As for SuhrawardT, in the Hikma ((a): 10), he
denies the definition of the human being as a rational animal ( al-hayawdn an-
ndtiq), which he attributes to peripatetics, and claims that rationality is accidental
and posterior to the reality ( haqlqa ) of humanity.

4.1.2 The Relationship of the Body to the Soul

The body-soul relationship is an important theme in the Rasa ’il. 137 It is also close¬
ly connected with microcosmism: the theme opens the 26th epistle and is treated
extensively in both epistles on the microcosm-macrocosm analogy. The topic ap-

Even if the detailed meaning of the latter claim is left open, it implies psychological
microcosmism (see 5.3.2).

On definitions of the spiritual in man in al-Ghazall, see 5.1.

The importance of understanding the relationship between the body and the soul is
accentuated in the 48th epistle (R IV: 171), where four kinds of ignorance about the topic are
presented: those who are ignorant of the difference between the body and the soul, those who
do not know the way the soul is bound together with the body, those who do not know the
reason for this bondage and, lastly, those who do not know why the soul leaves the body.

99

pears, however, in many other contexts as well and is often explained through
brief references to microcosmic comparisons. In the epistle On the Saying of the
Wise that the World is a Large Man (e.g., R III: 218), the human soul is seen as a
prisoner in its bodily prison, which is a Neoplatonic metaphor popular in Sufi lit¬
erature. In a city, there are said to be both prisons and subterranean storehouses,
but also synagogues and mosques. Likewise among people there are some for
whom the body is a prison for the soul and others, like prophetic souls, who man¬
age to free themselves from mundane bonds.

Nevertheless, the tone of the analogies is not always as negative towards the
bodily aspect of the human being and, in fact, in most cases, the Ikhwan define the
relationship between the body and the soul in terms of mutual need: the soul, in its
relation to the body, is said to be like that of fruit flesh to the peel, a dressed man
to his clothes, a rider to his horse or a crew to the ship (R II: 59, II: 379, II: 459,
IV: 182). Although these comparisons explicitly define the body as subordinate to
the soul and the obvious aim of the authors is to accentuate the dominance of the
spiritual over the corporeal, they imply that the body is a crucial instrument for
the soul in its reaching for perfection. The instrumental value of the body for the
human being is very concretely accentuated in an analogy which compares the
soul with a craftsman: the soul operates in the body employing all its faculties and
parts like a craftsman, who works in his forge using all the utensils he needs (e.g.,
R II: 384-385 and III: 215). The same instrumental tone is used in the descriptions
of the body as a ship and the soul as its sailor (e.g., R III: 44).

The body-soul relationship is also relevant when death is treated. It is often
defined, like in the epistle on music (W: 92-93), as the separation of the mature
soul from the body: like the pearl from the oyster shell, the seed from the calyx,
the foetus from the womb or fruit from the peel. In the 27th epistle (R III: 5-7),
the development of an individual soul is examined in more detail through the
womb metaphor: like the foetus needs the womb in order to achieve its complete
form, the human soul needs the body for its mundane perfection. In the same
manner that the foetus which does not reach its completion during the nine
months of pregnancy cannot survive after birth, the human soul which does not
reach its perfection during its mundane path does not enter Paradise. The soul
separating from the body and entering the thereafter is also described by the met¬
aphor of a man entering a new city (see, e.g., R I: 167). This is interesting from
the perspective of the extensively used analogy of the human body as a city
dwelled in by the faculties of the soul. Elsewhere (R II: 395), on the other hand,
death is paralleled with the inhabitants leaving their city, which is more logical in
the light of this analogy.

The question concerning the definition of death is related to the views of the
Ikhwan on resurrection. The Ikhwan’s position is in this respect unclear. Although

100

they often lean towards the views of philosophers (see, e.g., R II: 50), which are
reflected in these analogies as well, in some contexts their views seem to be in
accordance with Islamic orthodoxy. 138

In the other texts of the corpus, the body-soul relationship is not treated as
comprehensively as in the Rasa 'il. Sometimes microcosmism appears in the con¬
text of the body-soul relationship solely at the level of expressions. In the Hibna,
SuhrawardT amalgamates with his light metaphorism a microcosmic expression
referring to the animal and human bodies with the word fortress (sTsiya) 1 ' 9 and the
rational human soul is described as a commanding light ( nur isfahbad) whose
image ( sanam) the fortress is (see, e.g., SuhrawardT (a): 134). 140

References to the same Neoplatonic metaphors as in the Rasd’il can also be
found in Sufi writings. Al-Ghazall, for instance, refers to the body as a mount for
the soul (see, e.g., al-Ghazall (c): 698 and 701). In addition to this, he declares
that the heart needs its mundane ( ad-dunyd ) path in order to reach perfection,
since it is impossible for a creature to reach God without passing through this
world. For this, the vehicle of the heart needs to be taken care of with the right
food and avoidance of the things which are destructive to it. (al-Ghazall (c): 698)

In more detail, al-Ghazall ((c): 695-697) examines the difference between the
spiritual and physiological aspects of the human being defining the relationship
between the heart as a bodily organ and its spiritual meaning. 141 He notes that the
real essence ( haqTqa ) of the human being is the subtle dimension of the heart. The
subtle dimension is spiritual and totally different from the bodily organ, which
appears even in animals and dead bodies. In spite of this, the bodily organ is said
to be connected with the spiritual heart. Although al-Ghazall refuses to go into the
details of this connection, he mentions that it is like the relationship of accidents
with substance, the characteristic to the thing characterized, the user of a utensil to
the utensil and the occupier of a place to the place. The heart, which is paralleled
with the Throne ( al- ‘ arsh ), while the chest is the Footstool ( al-kursi ), is then in a
way responsible for the relationship between the body and the soul. This position
of mediator given to the heart in Ajd 'ib al-qalb is treated mostly from the per-

On the bodily resurrection in the Rasa ’il, see Baffioni 1998.

Another word used in the Hikma for physical bodies is barrier ( barzakh ), a term whose
appearance in Ibn 'Arabi’s TadbTrat was examined in 3.3.1.

Use of the light metaphor is examined more extensively in 3.3.2.

The Ikliwan do not usually define the heart as the dwelling place of the spiritual in man, but
there are some references to this. In the 38th epistle (R III: 300), in a passage referring to the
Light Verse of the Qur’an (24:35), the Ikhwan remark that in that context the heart is not the
physical heart present in most animals, but the soul ( an-nafs ).

101

spective of mystical perfection and the (spiritual) heart appears as the encounter¬
ing place for sensory knowledge and divine knowledge. 142

In Ghayat al-haklm (49-50), the relationship between the human body and the
human soul is explained comparing it with the relationship of the individual man
with the universal man. It is said that as the bodily form of an individual human
being is to the form of an individual human being like an image or a peel, the spir¬
itual form of an individual human being is merely an image or a peel to the form
of the universal man.

Al-Qazwlnl ((a): 305), on the other hand, illustrates the body-soul relationship
with an analogy to a relationship between a wise man and a woman whom the
man desires. The woman has mundane needs such as food, drink, clothes and mar¬
riage, while the man does not need any of these. Just as the wise man should get
rid of his lust for a woman, so should the human soul get rid of the needs of the
body. In addition to this negative description, the Ajd 'ib also describes man as
the microcosm because the human body is “like a residence for the court of the
kingdom, which is constituted of the spiritual faculties of man” (al-QazwInl (a):
303).

An interesting view to the relationship between the spiritual ( ruhaniyya ) and
corporeal ( jismaniyya ) in general can be found in Kitdb ar-rahma (144), in which
the author explains that physical characteristics such as weight are dependent on
the spiritual features of the being: “The burdens ( athqdl ) of corporeal things are
only dwelling places and retuges for those spiritual things, they do not have force
{quwwa) or use in themselves.”

At first glance, in all these texts the soul - the nobler dimension of man -
seems to be the defining element of humanity. If it is treated at all, the body is
presented as subordinate to the soul. When it comes to the Ikhwan, the same dis¬
crepancy that applies to their views concerning bodily resurrection seems to char¬
acterize their conceptualization of corporeality more generally: on the one hand,
they represent negative attitudes towards the human body, resembling in this Neo¬
platonic Sufis, and, on the other hand, they argue neutrally and even positively in
the matter expressing special interest in the bodily aspect of man and the relation¬
ship of the two aspects of man. It seems that in this their views change depending
on the context. In the other texts, the body-soul relationship is treated separately
to some extent, and the human body as a dwelling place for the faculties of the
soul is usually seen as a neutral part of the definition of man everywhere outside
the Sufi tradition.

142

Al-Ghazali’s views on this will be examined in more detail in 5.3.3.2.

102

4.2 EXPLICIT PHYSIOLOGICAL COMPARISONS

By explicit comparisons I refer to listings of correspondences between two layers
of reality. The basic tone of comparisons is usually psychophysically holistic:
when the human being is in the position of the microcosm, the body and the soul
together often form a microcosm. Because of this, a distinction between the spir¬
itual and physiological aspects of comparisons is somewhat artificial. In this chap¬
ter, however, I will concentrate on the bodily aspect of man in these comparisons
and examine the way the concept of corporeality is treated in them. 143

In the Rasd'il, explicit physiological comparisons appear in different contexts.
The 23rd epistle On the Structure of the Body is for the most part dedicated to
these comparisons, which underlines the importance of microcosmism in the con¬
cept of corporeality among the Ikhwan. Explicit physiological comparisons rarely
appear in other texts, and when they do they are usually parts of descriptions of
the human being or, at times, of the heavenly spheres. This chapter will be divided
into three subsections according to the themes which define the nature of the
physiological comparisons and their meaning in the philosophical systems of the
texts.

4.2.1 Comparisons and Hierarchy in the Human Body

The holistic idea of man expressed through physiological comparisons gives an
image of the human body as an organism constituted of co-operating parts and
members, and some comparisons seem to underline the hierarchy of this system.
In the following, I will examine comparisons as expressions of the idea of man,
analysing the structure of the human body and its hierarchies phrased in them. I
will first concentrate on the inner organs and their functions and then turn to the
human faculties and then places in the human body.

4.2.1.1 Inner Organs in Comparisons

The Ikhwan seem to be particularly interested in the parallelism between func¬
tions of the heavenly bodies and the inner organs of the human body. They exam¬
ine this analogy at remarkable length at the end of the 26th epistle (R II: 476-
479). First of all, the heart is said to correspond to the Sun: both are located at the
centre. From the Sun, light and life are distributed to all parts of the universe.

Comparisons are examined from the perspective of the human soul in Chapter 5. The explicit
comparisons as expressions of the hierarchies of the human faculties - a topic which is also
partly relevant from the physiological aspect of man - will be examined in 5.1.2.2.

103

Likewise, heat circulates to all parts of the body from the heart. 144 The spleen is
compared to Saturn, which puts together form and matter. In a similar manner,
from the spleen, blood transmits black bile’s coldness and dryness to all parts of
the body, which is the reason for the solid moistness of blood. The liver is related
to Jupiter, because order and harmony proceed from both. Mars finds its resem¬
blance in the gall bladder, from which yellow bile spreads to all parts of the hu¬
man body as a sedative for the bodily humours. The stomach is compared with
Venus, the planet of pleasures. Venus is related to all joy and enjoyment of both
spiritual and material beings in the spheres and in the sublunar world. Likewise,
the stomach relates to the lust for alimentation, which forms the building material
for the body and its humours. The five senses, as well as consciousness and wis¬
dom, are connected to Mercury. The spirit of Mercury resembles the flow from
the middle of the brain, which causes the actions of the faculties of the human
soul, such as sensing, reflection, deliberation and knowledge. The activity of the
Moon is described as twofold: in the first part of each (lunar) month its face re¬
plete with light faces the earth and at the end of each month it faces the heavenly
spheres. The assignment of the lungs in the human body is twofold in a similar
manner: it enables the entrance of air to the body and delivers it to the heart,
which spreads it to each part of the body. On the other hand, the lungs also trans¬
mit ail' out of the body producing, for instance, sounds and words. 145

Different astrological positions of the heavenly bodies have been discussed
earlier in the same epistle (R II: 467) in a subsection which describes the relation
of the human body with the four elements. It ends with a comparison between a
city-state and the heavenly bodies. The heavenly bodies stand in a relation to the
Sun similar to the officers in their relation to the king. Thus, Mars is like a com¬
mander of the troops, Mercury like scribes and ministers, Jupiter like lawyers and

This also appears in the 22nd epistle of the Rasa 'll, when the Ikhwan say that all animals
have their place in the holistic system of the cosmos, some being instrumental in their
relation with others. This is illustrated hy comparing the Sun in the universe to the heart in
the body.

Widengren (1980: 304) mentions Hurufi texts, in which there are similar passages
mentioning that the heart is the Sun, the liver is Jupiter, the back is the Moon, the spleen is
Mars, the kidneys are Saturn and the brain is Mercury (Huart 1909: 85). The same
comparison occurs elsewhere in the Rasa’il as well, in the 20th epistle as part of a
description of the world as a large man (R II: 145-147) and later in a very detailed form in
the 49th epistle (R IV: 214-223). An interesting parallelism to these comparisons can also he
found in the epistle on magic (R IV: 345), in which the Ikhwan present a list of the heavenly
bodies and their counterparts in the organs and the body parts of animals. Only Saturn, which
is related to the spleen and the right ear, and the Moon, which is related to the lungs and the
left eye by night, appear similar in this comparison, while Jupiter is related to the heart and
the left ear, Mars to the kidneys and the right nostril, the Sun to the stomach and the right eye
during the day, Venus to the heart, the face and the breast, and Mercury to the gall bladder
and the tongue.

104

scholars of religious sciences, Saturn like treasurers and trustees and Venus like
slave-girls and songstresses. The Moon on the first days of the month is like a
rebel, but acts like an imitator for the rest of the month. 146 Although this is not a
microcosm-macrocosm analogy as defined in this study, because the position of
the microcosm is not reserved for man, it lays emphasis on the view that the hu¬
man body is not the only layer of reality corresponding to the heavenly spheres:
the same applies, for instance, to a city-state. 147

Inner organs are also described in city-state comparisons. A reference to this
kind of analogy appears, for example, in the 22nd epistle ( G : 18) of the Rasd’il,
where the holistic composition of the human body is described with the micro¬
cosm-macrocosm analogy. It is said that “There is no organ, great or small, that
does not serve and minister to some other, sustaining and supporting it or enhanc¬
ing its tli net ion and improving its usefulness” (trans. Goodman and McGregor, in
G: 81). Then it is said that the brain is like a king and other organs and body parts
form a hierarchy below it. Goodman and McGregor ( G: 81 n. 52) note that the
brain as the leading organ was a revolutionary view in the history of human anat-

A similar comparison appears in the 22nd epistle (G: 169). In it, however, the intention is
sociological. It describes the structure of a Jinn society and admires its strict hierarchy and
the loyalty of the Jinns to their king. However, approximately the same counterparts appear
for the planets in this comparison: “They follow their kings as the stars in the heavens follow
that greatest of luminaries, the Sun. For the Sun in the celestial sphere is like a king, and the
other stars are like his vassals, troops and subjects. Mars serves, as it were, as his general;
Jupiter as judge, Saturn as treasurer; Mercury as minister, Venus as consort. The moon is
crown prince. The other stars are his troops, vassals, and subjects.” (Trans. Goodman and
McGregor, in G: 237) In the 16th epistle (R II: 30), the heavenly bodies are said to be like the
servants and soldiers of the Sun, whose central position, with three planets below and three
above it, is like that of a king in his kingdom. Later in the same epistle (39—40), the central
position of the earth in the universe is compared with that of the Ka 'ba. Pilgrims circulating
around it are like the heavenly bodies (the same comparison can be found in R II: 138). This
rotation of the heavenly bodies is illustrated with an Indian story of a king, who built a city
with a circumference of 60 parasangs. He sent seven men to walk around the city with
different daily journeys. The final duration of their journeys demonstrates the different times
it takes for each of the heavenly bodies to rotate around the earth. (R II: 40M2)

The microcosm-macrocosm analogies describing the planets and their relations to each other
appear in other texts as well. Al-Qazwlm ((a): 23), for instance, mentions that: "the Sun is
the greatest of the heavenly bodies and its light is the strongest of the lights. Its natural place
is in the fourth sphere. Its position among the stars is like that of a king, and other stars are
like its servants and solders. The Moon is like a minister and crown prince. Mercury is like a
scribe, Mars like a commander of the troops, Jupiter like a judge, Saturn is like a treasurer
and Venus is like servants and slave-girls.” As we can see, the positions of the planets are
defined in a fashion quite similar to those defined by the Ikhwan. In the 'Aja’ib, the
comparison continues with an analogy between the heavenly spheres and the lunar sphere:
“The spheres are like climates, the zodiacal signs like countries. The terminal points are like
cities, the degrees like troops, and the minutes like quarters, the seconds like houses.” In the
Beirut edition (al-QazwIm (b): 27), degrees are said to be like villages instead of troops,
which fits the context better.

105

omy when it was first presented by Galen. According to him, the faculties of the
animal soul are in the case of higher animals governed by the brain. This was not
accepted by some philosophers, and among Islamic thinkers Goodman and
McGregor mention al-Farabl, who still followed the Aristotelian idea of the heart
as the organ controlling the rest of the body. This is the case in the mystical tradi¬
tion as well: especially al-Ghazall gives the heart a special position among the
organs.

The Ikhwan are not quite clear in this either. The two comparisons of the
Rasd'il presented above contradict each - the former presents the heart as the
leading organ, while in the latter the brain takes this position. These kinds of dis¬
crepancies seem to be due to comparisons simply having different premises. The
former comparison concentrates on describing the functions of the inner organs,
and the heart is related to the Sun simply because of its central location in the
body. The latter, on the other hand, focuses more clearly on the hierarchy of the
inner organs, and thus, is more relevant as regards the Ikhwan’s position in defin¬
ing the hierarchy in the human body. In general, although hierarchical connota¬
tions are to some extent also present in the astronomical comparisons, they usual¬
ly appear more explicitly in city-state comparisons. As will be seen later, in spir¬
itual comparisons as well, the leader of the human faculties varies depending on
the emphasis of the comparison (see 5.1.2.2).

4.2.1.2 The Body as a Dwelling Place

In some physiological comparisons, the psychophysical whole which the human
being forms appear as a prevailing theme, and it is examined through the relation¬
ship between body parts and the faculties of the human being. 14s Usually the body
is presented as a dwelling place for the faculties of the soul and the physical activ¬
ities of the human being:

We say: The body resembles a city in its many wonders, in the structure of its members
and in the various ways of the composition of its parts. The soul is like a king of the
city and its diverse faculties are like soldiers and officers in it. Its acts and movements
in the body are like inhabitants and servants. That is to say, the human soul has many
faculties, the number of which is only known to God, the Sublime. Each of these facul¬
ties has its own particular location in one of the members of the human body different
from the others and its own particular relation to the soul different from the others. (R
II: 468)

The city-state comparisons, which could be called architectural comparisons when
the physiological aspect is in focus, do not necessarily parallel the human body
with an entire city. For instance, in the Rasd’iTs epistle On the Structure of the
Body, a city-state comparison is followed by a comparison which concentrates on

For more on these faculties, see 5.1.2.1.

106

the correspondence between the body and a house. It is clarified that in the house
there is everything its inhabitants need, like in the body there is all that the soul
needs. Firstly, the comparison concentrates on similarities between the body parts
and the rooms of a house:

The legs upon which the body stands are like foundation of the house. The head at the
highest point of the body is like the upper chamber in the house. The back is like the
back of the house and the face is like the front of the house. The neck in its length is
like the portico of the house. The opening of the throat, where the voice streams from,
is like the hallway. The chest in the middle of the body is like the patio of the house.

The lungs are like the living and storage rooms in the house. The lungs and their cold¬
ness are like the summer-rooms. The nostrils and trachea in the throat are like ventila¬
tion 149 . (R II: 383)

After that the comparison continues with a description of the organs and then
functions by means of a household and the activities within it:

The heart with its innate warmth is like a winter room. The stomach which digests the
food is like the kitchen. The liver and the entries of blood into it are like a room for
drinking water. The courses of the veins, the circulation of the blood and the pulse to
all parts of the body are like the corridors of a house. The spleen and the appearance of
turbid blood into it are like a storage room for furniture. The gallbladder and the sharp¬
ness of yellow bile into it are like the weapons room. The thorax and the diaphragm are
like the women’s room. The intestines and the burden of food within it are like the toi¬
let. The bladder and the coming of the urine into it are like the lavatory. (R II: 383-384)

Then the Ikhwan turn to the apertures and materials of the human body:

The ways of excrement and urine are in the lower part of the body like the plumbing of
the house. The bones supporting the body are like walls. The tendons extended to the
parts of the body are like supporting trunks and crossbeams for the walls. The flesh on
the bones and nerves is like mortar. The ribs are like the columns of the house. The
cavities inside the bone are like chests and drawers and the marrow in them are like
jewels and valuables in the drawers. The apertures in the head are like windows in the
upper chambers. The breath is like smoke. The middle of the brain is like columned
hall and the pupils are like reception rooms. The eyelids between them are like cur¬
tains. The mouth is like the entrance to the house and the nose is like the entrance way.

The lips are like the leaves of the door. The teeth are like a lattice screen and the tongue
like a chamberlain. (R II: 384)

At the end of the comparison, the authors refer briefly to the inhabitants of the
house:

The intellect at the centre of the brain is like a king sitting in the middle of the court¬
yard, in the front of the house and in the meeting room. The inner senses are like boon
companions and the outer senses like soldiers and spies. The eyes are like watchmen
and the ears like agents who bring information to the king. The hands are like servants

149

I read badahanj instead of al-Bustam’s badahaj.

107

and the fingers like artisans. To sum up: the body parts have their counterparts in the
activity of the lord of the house. (R II: 384)

In this comparison the Ikhwan name among the inhabitants both the faculties of
the soul, like the inner and outer senses, and the body parts, such as the tongue,
eyes, ears, hands and fingers. This is remarkable, because usually in the compari¬
sons the physiological perspective of the human being is seen as a counterpart to
the material form and structure of the macrocosm, while the faculties of the soul
are compared with the living or spiritual entities, in this case the inhabitants of the
city. 150 A similar phenomenon also appears, however, in the Ghaya, where the
relationship between the faculties of the soul and the body parts responsible for
them is examined:

His eyes are spies of the intellectual faculty ( al-quwwa an-natiqa) which is like a king.

His ears are like his agents who bring information and the tongue like his interpreters.

The heart is his ministry of knowledge. The stomach is his treasury house and his cook¬
ing pot and the liver like its hole for water. The gall-bladder is his self-control for its
flesh not to rot and it is the salt of the body. His medicament, the lungs, are his ventila¬
tor and the hands are his chamberlains and the legs his mount. ( Ghaya: 44)

In a less detailed manner the same appears in the Ajd 'ib, where members of the
body together with bodily faculties - referring most likely to the outer senses - are
described as servants, while inner faculties have a higher position as different
kinds of artisans.

The soul is in the body like a governor in his province. The faculties and members of
the body are his servants and he gives them orders. They have to obey him and cannot
oppose him. The body is a kingdom, a residence and a city of the soul. The heart is in
the middle of this kingdom and the members of the body are its servants. The inner
faculties are like artisans of the city. (al-QazwInl (a): 303-304)

In this comparison, the author seems to place the soul physically in the heart, in
the middle of the bodily kingdom. One of the ways of examining the body-soul
relationship and the hierarchy in the human body is the presentation of the physi¬
cal locations of the faculties. This occurs not only in city-state comparisons, but
also in comparisons between the human being and the heavenly spheres. Then the
faculties of the soul are most commonly compared with the heavenly bodies like
in a comparison appearing in both the Rasa 'il (e.g., R II: 464-465) and the Ghaya
(46), in which the seven corporeal faculties - and as their spiritual counterparts
the five senses as well as the faculty of speech and the intellectual faculty - are
paralleled with the seven heavenly bodies (see 5.1.2.2).

This can be seen in a concise form in the short analogies referred to when the relationship of
the body to the soul is explained (see 4.1.2) and in the comparisons concentrating on the
hierarchies of the spiritual faculties (see 5.1.2.2).

108

A comparison between the human faculties and heavenly spheres also occurs
in the Sirr (444-446, VI 6.1-6.2). In it, the concentration is on the shape of the
human head. In this analogy, which has its equivalents in the Greek Hermetic tra¬
dition, 151 the correspondence depends on movement: the circularity of the human
head is due to elevation of the movement. When the prime matter extended and
reached its utter limit, it was cut off from its lowly origin and became circular.
This explains the circular movement of the stars: the stars were created of fire
which rose from inside the earth and when the fire reached the celestial spheres, it
made the heavens circulate. The passage is summarized as follows: “for this I
have compared the human head with the dome of the sphere, viz. because it re¬
sembles it. This is (also) why I have called him (man) the microcosm.” In addition
to this structural resemblance, the seven faculties of the human being are said to
be located in the head: the head has seven open doors, which, like the seven plan¬
ets ruling the spheres, rule and guide the human being in everything.

Also in the Ghdya (44), there is a comparison emphasizing the location of the
spir itual faculties in the head. There it is explained that the human head resembles
the heavenly spheres for four reasons. First of all, it is spherical and circular in
shape. In addition to these physical qualities, the subtlety and the lights of the
head resemble the lights at the level of the spheres. These lights are the human
senses, which are listed as sight, hearing, touch, taste and speech.

The faculties and then' relationships with the human body are examined in
more detail in various comparisons, which are more relevant from the perspective
of the spiritual in the human being than his bodily aspect (see 5.1.2.2). Often these
descriptions explain the locations of the outer senses - sight, hearing, touch, smell
and taste - which mostly occur in the body parts connected to them and, in this
way, the human body appears as a dwelling place and a physical basis for the
functions of these abilities. The inner or spiritual cognitive faculties are also relat¬
ed to the corporeal aspect of the human being since they have their location in the
different cavities of the brain. In spite of their physiological aspect, these compar¬
isons, employed, for instance, by the Ikhwan and al-QazwInl, evidently concen¬
trate on the epistemological perspective of the human being. Nevertheless, they
show that the microcosmic idea has - even in this clearly spiritual form - a physi¬
ological dimension as well, and especially the Ikhwan are interested in scrutiniz¬
ing details of the relationship between the body and the soul even when it comes
to cognitive theories.

See Festugiere 1950: 127.

109

4.2.2 Mythological Features of Comparisons

The philosophical meaning of the physiological comparisons is often difficult to
define. Many elements appearing in them are due to the influence of earlier tradi¬
tions of microcosmism. An important - and probably the most obvious - aspect of
the physiological comparisons is the influence of mythological traditions. These
analogies were one of the routes through which the earlier Middle Eastern mytho¬
logical, cosmological and anthropological views were transmitted to the Islamic
tradition. Naturally, in the corpus such unlslamic mythological ideas as the crea¬
tion of the world from the body parts of primordial man or a deity do not appear
per se. Even so, as noted in the earlier research (e.g., Widengren 1980: 300-303),
comparisons preserve many mythological elements.

A classical example of this is the comparison made by the Ikhwan between
the human body and the world:

The (human) body is like the earth: bones are like mountains, the marrow like minerals.

The stomach is like the ocean, the intestines like rivers, the veins like rivulets, the flesh
is like soil. Hair is like plants, hairy parts like fertile lands while bald areas are like salt
desert. The front-side of the human body is like inhabited lands and the back-side is
like an unpopulated hinterland. What is in the front of him is like the east, what is be¬
hind is like the west. The right side resembles south while the left side is like north.
Breathing is like the wind, words like thunder, speech like lightning, laughter like the
daylight, tears like rain, suffering and sorrow like the darkness of the night. Sleeping is
like death, being awake like life, childhood like spring, adolescence like summer, mid¬
life like autumn and old age like winter. (R II: 466—467)

In the TadbTrdt, Ibn ‘ArabI (108) briefly refers to an analogy resembling this and
says that in the human being there is similar growth as in the Large World and it
can be seen, for instance, in hair and nails. Different waters found in the universe
have their equivalents in the human being as well: eyes secrete salty fluid, ears
bitter fluid and sweet fluid is related to the mouth. Winds are also mentioned, but
according to Ibn ' Arab! (109), four winds, the north wind, the south wind, the east
wind and the west wind correspond to four bodily faculties: attraction, retention,
digestion and excretion. Later, though, in the 16th chapter of the work, he treats
the four seasons appearing in the Ikhwan’s comparison, in a different manner. He
parallels spring with youth, summer with the age of self-contemplation, autumn
with death and winter with purgatory. (Ibn 'ArabI 200-203)

Widengren (1980: 304) refers to a similar passage in Hurufi texts (Huart 109: 85), which
comes after a description of the inner organs as planets (see note 145). As Takeshita points
out, al-Ghazall presents a similar analogy in Kimiva-yi sa'adat (Takeshita 1987: 99). Scott
Kugle (2007: 44) says that the mythological idea of the world as a reproduction of the body
of a cosmic giant has been preserved in Sufi tradition in the form of such analogies and refers
to the view appearing in Sufi texts according to which the 360 days of the year correspond to
the 360 mountains of the world as well as to the 360 bones of the human body.

110

A passage resembling another part of the Ikhwan’s comparison can be found
in the Ghdya , in which it is said that: “The eyes are like the Sun and the Moon, the
nostrils are like winds, the ears are like east and west. The front side is like the
daytime and back is like the night.” (Ghdya: 44) 153

A stronger “Islamization” of the comparison between the human body and the
earth can be found in Mulla Sadra’s (d. 1640) IksJr al- drijm. in which a physio¬
logical comparison appears in the description of the resurrection and its two -
greater and smaller - dimensions:

Everything in the Greater resurrection - which is the death of all the individuals of the
cosmos - has an equivalent in the Smaller resurrection. When your body - which is
your earth specific to you - is destroyed through your death, then the earth will have
been shaken with a mighty shaking (99:1). When your bones - which are the mountains
of your earth - decay, then (the earth and the mountains will have been lifted up) and
crushed with a single blow (69:14) so your mountains will be scattered like ashes
(20:105). When your heart - which is the sun of your world - is darkened at the
(soul’s) extraction, then your sun will have been folded up (81:1). (Mulla Sadra: 14-15,
trans. Chittick)

In this passage, we can see how the same elements appearing in the comparison of
the Ikhwan are connected with Qur anic references. Quotations from the Qur’an
appear in the context of microcosmism in the Rasa il as well (see 3.2.1 n. 94), but
they are usually connected with other forms of the analogy than its physiological
aspect.

Considering the transmission of physiological comparisons, an interesting ex¬
ample can be found in an analogy appearing in al-QazwInl’s ' Ajd 'ib al-makhluqat,
which seems quite likely to be connected with a similar comparison by the
Ikhwan. In addition to the similarity between the versions of the Ikhwan and al-
Qazwlnl, an interesting aspect of this particular comparison is that it contains
some elements which resemble the mythological predecessors of Islamic micro¬
cosm-macrocosm speculation.

In the ' Ajd’ib , the comparison takes place after al-QazwInl’s description of
the construction of the human body and its division into non-compound (mu-
tashdbiha) and compound (murakkaba) parts. The former are the twelve materials
of the body, including bone, cartilage, nerves, ligament, flesh, artery, jugular
veins, fat, membrane, skin and the cerebrum. Compounds include outer, visible
organs such as eyes, ears, hail', and inner organs. Before going into details about

In ghuldt literature, there are passages in which the body of God is explained as a
microcosm. An example of this appears in Umm al-kitab originating from the eighth century.
In it, the head of God is described as the Most Sublime Spirit, the right eye as the Greatest
Spirit and the left eye as the Spirit of Thinking. His ears are the Utmost Mixing and the
Divine Shining and the nostrils the Spirit of Knowledge and the Spirit of Omnipotence. His
tongue is the Holy Spirit and his heart the Spirit of Belief. (Hameen-Anttila 2001: 57-58)

111

the human faculties, al-Qazwml presents a comparison which he attributes to
“some wise men”. In it, the construction process of a city is described to the
smallest detail:

There is a resemblance between the human body and a city. Some wise men say that
God the exalted created the human body, arranged it and blew into it his spirit. This
blowing was like the ground of the house. The composition and the joining together of
the parts of the body are like the city built from different materials such as stone, mud-
brick, baked bricks, gypsum, claytiles, clay, limestone, ashes, wood, iron and so forth.

He built it well and raised its structure, fortified its walls, sketched its streets, divided
its quarters and decorated its houses. He filled up its storehouses and made its rivers
flow, opened its channels, made its domains active, put its merchants to their places
and organized its rule. He gave servants to its king and created nine substances differ¬
ent in form, and they are materials for building the city. Then he composed the materi¬
als and set them above each other in ten layers next to each other and made them re¬
cline on 248 pillars. Then he nailed the city up and extended its ropes and joined it with
720 ties which were extended and twisted around it. Then he decreed the city to be
steady, divided its shops and deposited in it eleven treasury houses full of jewels of
various colours. He extended its streets and made pass its ways and opened 330 gates
as passways for its inhabitants. He made springs flow out of it and dug 360 rivers into
it, brooks flowing differently. He opened twelve gates to its walls making entrances to
its gardens. He built well this city by the hands of eight craftsmen co-operating with
each other. They are the servants of the city. He put five watchmen to guard it in order
to conserve its pillars. Then he elevated this city in the air on two columns and made it
move to six directions with two wings. After that he settled there three tribes which are
its inhabitants: jinns, humans and angels, and appointed as their chief one king and
commanded him to preserve it and admonished him to rule it. (al-QazwInl (a): 354)

After this account follows the explanation for the analogy:

The nine substances are bone, marrow, nerves, veins, blood, flesh, skin, nail and hair.

The ten layers are head, neck, breast, stomach, thorax, groins, hips, thighs, legs and
feet. The pillars are bones, and the ties are sinews. The eleven storehouses are brain,
spinal marrow, lungs, heart, liver, spleen, gall bladder, stomach, intestines, kidneys and
testicles. The roads and the streets are arteries and the rivers are jugular veins. The
twelve doors are eyes, ears, nostrils, nipples, apertures in the private parts of the body,
mouth and navel. The eight craftsmen are attraction, retention, nutrition, excretion, di¬
gestion, growth, reproduction and production. The five guardians are the five senses:
hearing, sight, touch, taste and smell. The columns are legs and the wings are hands
and the six directions are what is well known. The three tribes are three souls: the de¬
sire soul is like the jinns, the animal soul is like the men and the speech is like the an¬
gels. The one king is the intellect. (al-QazwInl (a): 354-355)

The “wise men” refers most likely to the Ikhwan, since the resemblance between
al-QazwInl’s comparison and the comparison of the Ikhwan in the epistle On the
Structure of the Body (R II: 380-382) is evident - there are only some minor dif¬
ferences between them. These kinds of quotations of earlier sources are, however,
nothing exceptional: in 'aja ’/^-literature, like in many other mediaeval literary
genres, it is common to quote other authors without references. It cannot, though,
be excluded that the two works may also be citing a common source.

112

Al-QazwInT borrows the comparison appearing also in the Rasa il so literally
that, for instance, its listing of the materials of the human body differs from his
own view presented in the same chapter immediately before the comparison. In¬
stead of the eleven materials he introduces, in the comparisons these are said to be
nine, which is in accordance with the comparison of the Ikhwan.

The way of describing the appearance of the correspondences in the process
of making the human being or the city resembles the mythological idea of the mi¬
crocosm-macrocosm analogy as something connected with the process of the
creation in accordance with the bodily form of the primordial human being or a
deity. Another detail, which also reminds one of the mythological creation narra¬
tive, is the posture of the human being, which with his “two wings” resembles the
Iranian Gayomart, who is described by Widengren (1980: 300) as standing with
his “arms outstretched as one cmcified”. 154 On the other hand, this also brings to
mind an angel, which would be a rather surprising element in this kind of physio¬
logical comparison or microcosmism of the Ikhwan in general. In the Rasd’il,
angels are not presented as microcosms. In the light of Suhrawardl’s human ar¬
chetype also known as Gabriel (see 3.2.2), this would not, however, be totally
absurd.

Though city-state comparisons would at first glance hint at Greek philosophi¬
cal sources, comparisons between man and the city are not excluded from mytho¬
logical tradition either and the sociological aspect is also present in them. Widen¬
gren (1980: 302) refers to a comparison in the Zoroastrian Shkand Gumanlk Vi-
chdr between the body parts of the human being and the four classes of men: the
head represents the priesthood, the hands the class of warriors, the belly hus¬
bandmen and the feet artisans. Even if the three tribes in the Ikhwan’s and al-
Qazwlnl’s comparison arguably stand in a different position from the classes of
men in the Zoroastrian comparison, they also bring a touch of the sociological
aspect to the comparison.

Despite the obvious similarities between the comparisons, there are some mi¬
nor differences between al-QazwInl’s and Ikhwan’s accounts. These may either
simply be due to the differences between Butrus al-Bustanl’s edition and the sup¬
posed manuscript used by the author of the ‘Ajd’ib or reflect differences in the
views of the authors. One of them is the absence of the bodily humours in the
comparison of al-QazwInl. As for the Ikhwan, the humoral theory is essential, also
appearing several times in the context of microcosmism (see 4.3.4). Another is

154

Widengren (1980: 301-302) notes that in both Indian and Iranian cosmological speculation,
the body of the creature with his outstretched arms, according to which the world is created,
is equal in length and breadth, which is, as Widengren points out, in accordance with human
anatomy. The Ikhwan do not mention this in the explicit physiological comparisons, but it is
present in the epistle on music, in which the perfect proportions of the human body are
described and connected with cosmology (see 4.3.1.2).

113

that the Ikhwan mention seven craftsmen while al-QazwInl makes them eight. If
this is an intentional modification, it can be explained in two ways. Firstly, a pos¬
sible reason for this are the differences in their views concerning the spiritual fac¬
ulties of man (see 5.1.2.1). Secondly, it can be explained by the meaning given to
numbers in the Rasa 'il. For al-QazwInl, numbers do not play any significant role
in his thought, while for the Ikhwan numbers used in comparisons are never hap¬
hazard and the same numbers occur again and again in them: seven is an often
occurring number, whereas eight - in spite of its uniqueness in numerology - ap¬
pears only rarely.

In general the meaning given to certain numbers in the Rasa 'il is reflected in
the idea of man and in microcosmism as well, and they are strongly present in
explicit comparisons especially in their physiological form. Among important
numbers in the comparisons of the Rasa’il are seven, nine and twenty-eight. 155
These are found at all layers of reality and the structure of the human body as well
as the faculties of the soul acting in it are always quantitatively defined in the
frames of these numbers. It seems that the recurrence of these numbers in the mi¬
crocosm-macrocosm comparisons is not primarily due to their numerological val¬
ue, because in the 32nd and 33rd epistles, where the Pythagorean numerology is
treated, these particular numbers receive little attention - except for number nine,
whose uniqueness is treated extensively in the 33rd epistle (R III: 206). In then
treatment of the uniqueness and cosmological meaning of numbers, the authors
seem to be most interested in such numbers as two, four, five, six and nine. 156
Seven, for instance, does not receive much interest: indeed in the 33rd epistle its
special features are not treated at all. More than for then numerological value,
seven, nine and twenty-eight seem to have been selected for then astronomical
role as the numbers, respectively, of the planets, spheres and mansions of the
moon. Twenty-eight is additionally granted a special position for being the num¬
ber of Arabic letters.

In addition to these astronomically essential numbers, among the most im¬
portant numbers appearing in the comparisons of the Rasa 'il is undoubtedly four,
which is an obvious choice for various reasons. Four elements and their appear¬
ance in the human body are naturally a basis for the ontology of the Ikhwan and

The Ikhwan (W: 111) themselves, however, deny the uniqueness of number seven to which
according to them “the religious sects” give too much weight.

The uniqueness of certain numbers has in this context been explained by the appearance of
the number at various layers of reality. For instance, in the 33rd epistle (R III: 206-207),
number five is said to appear as the number of human senses, parts of the plants (roots,
stems, leaves, flowers and fruits) and five noble shapes in the Euclidian mathematics, but in
some hilarious contexts as well, such as “there are five days in the week which have a
number in their name in all languages”, which certainly applies to Arabic and Persian, which
the authors give as examples, but not to many others.

114

for the mediaeval worldview in general.The uniqueness of number four in the
human body will be examined in more detail below and it will be seen that the
fourfold division of the human being also appears in the context of the microcos-
mic idea in other texts of the study corpus (see 4.3.4).

Number eight in al-QazwInl’s comparison presented above, is, however, an
interesting number from the perspective of the comparisons in the Rasa il. In the
33rd epistle (R III: 206), where the speciality of many other numbers is treated
extensively, number eight is not treated at all, and there is only a reference to the
epistle on music. In it, eight is explained to have a special role, for instance, for
being ratio defining diameters of the spheres. A special characteristic attached to
number eight is also its mathematical relationship with four. ( W : 105-106) Never¬
theless, in the explicit comparisons of the Ikhwan eight occurs very rarely.

A comparison which cannot be counted among the comparisons which were
influenced by earlier mythological tradition, but is connected with the Islamic
religious tradition as well as with numbers, is the one the Ikhwan present in their
last epistle of the second part on the natural sciences (R III: 143-145). In it, the
Arabic alphabet is paralleled at the same time with the world as a whole and with
the human body. Just as the Arabic alphabet is the most perfect and eloquent
among alphabets, the human body is the most perfect among animals. The number
of alphabets appears at the level of the universe in the 28 mansions of the moon
and it is said that in the human body one can find members “resembling these
numbers”. 158 At the beginning of the passage, the first four letters (alif ba \ ta
and tha ’) are explained to be the roots for everything comprising all beings and
corresponding to numbers in the same position, which are elsewhere mentioned to
be 1, 2, 3 and 4 (see, e.g., R I: 53-54). Numbers are also often paralleled with the
first levels of emanation (see 3.1.2). Alif is described as the Intellect and bd' as the
Soul. In the sublunar world, the shape of the human body, on account of its up¬
right posture, is said to be like alif while “animal forms resemble a curved line”,
meaning the curve of the second (as well as the third and the fourth) letter. This -

In addition to the four elements, different kinds of fourfold divisions appear in the
examination of the human body. According to Conger (1922: 38), in the Judeo-Christian
tradition the notion that the human being was created from dust has been thought to mean the
four types of dust from which different materials of the human body were formed: bones
were created from white dust, blood from red dust, intestines from black dust and nerves
from yellow dust. On the ancient concept of the Vitruvian man and number five as the
number of the microcosm, see Wayman 1982: 185.

In the 40th epistle (R III: 381), the Ikhwan refer to a similar kind of analogy between Arabic
alphabet, man and this time other animals as well. There it is clarified that in the back of the
human being there are 28 vertebrae.

115

perhaps somewhat clumsy - comparison brings the alphabets of the holy language
to the manifold system of the microcosm-macrocosm analogies. 159

4.2.3 Astrology in Physiological Comparisons

In addition to its mythological impact, the Hermetic influence cannot be excluded
in the explicit physiological comparisons. 160 Marquet (1975: 243-244) points out
that in the case of the Ikhwan, the interest in anatomical microcosm-macrocosm
comparisons might have its origins in such Hermetic sources as Kitdb al-usfutds.
The comparison of the Ikhwan presented above concerning the correspondence
between the human body and the earth has elements which appear in the Hermetic
tradition as well, like crying being related to rain. Also comparisons between the
human head and the heavenly spheres, which can be found in the Sirr and the
Ghdya, resemble those in Hermetic sources. In addition to these individual com¬
parisons, probably the most obvious Hermetic feature in the physiological com¬
parisons is the presence of astrology. When it comes to physiological compari¬
sons, the heavenly spheres take the role of the macrocosm more often than the
city-state, which is the most common macrocosm in the comparisons concentrat¬
ing on the human soul.

Most of the correspondences found between the human body and the heavenly
spheres are structural. In the 26th epistle (R II: 463), the Ikhwan describe a corre¬
spondence between the different layers of the spheres and the materials of the hu¬
man body, both nine in number. The layers of the spheres and the materials of the
human body are found to be similar in the way they are entwined together: “The
nine spheres are combined one around the other. In a similar manner, the nine
materials of the human body are entwined one around the other.” These nine ma¬
terials of the body are bone, the cerebrum, flesh, veins, blood, nerves, skin, hair

159

In the 31th epistle as well, it can be seen that the religious meaning of the Arabic language is
important for the Ikhwan: the differences between languages are repeatedly compared with
the differences between religions. Ebstein and Sviri (2011) examine the letter mysticism
influencing Risalat al-huruf, falsely attributed to Sahl al-Tustari, and compare its views, for
instance, with those of the Ikhwan. They find the idea that the 28 letters form the foundation
of all beings, be they physical or spiritual, and thus, the idea that the world is a divine book is
something typical of, not only the Ikhwan, but also of Ibn ‘ArabI and Ibn Masarra. These
three parallel letters, for instance, with the lunar mansions and the human faculties. (Ebstein
and Sviri 2011: 216-218) Ebstein and Sviri (2011: 214, 233) divide letter mysticism in the
Islamic tradition into two: firstly, to the symbolic and etymological approach found
especially in Sufi texts and, secondly, to the cosmogonic and cosmological scheme, in which
"letters are seen as the building blocks of creation”. The Ikhwan are defined as representing
the latter group.

160 It has to be acknowledged, however, that both of these traditions are partly built on the same
Greek sources, which makes it impossible to totally distinguish between Hermetic and
(other) mythological features.

116

and nail. In the Ghdya (45), the same idea appears with some differences in mate¬
rials: the outmost sphere is said to be al-muhlt, whose parallel in the human body
is void, and only eight materials are listed excluding blood and vessels from the
Ikhwan’s list and including muscles.

Later in the same subsection of the Rasa 'il (R II: 465), the mansions of the ce¬
lestial bodies are said to be related to the apertures of the body: the eyes to the
mansion of Jupiter, the ears to that of Mercury, the nostrils and the breasts to that
of Venus, apertures of the private parts to the mansion of Saturn. The mouth cor¬
responds to the mansion of the Sun and the navel to that of the Moon, because the
navel is the entrance of alimentation before birth and the mouth afterwards. The
apertures of the private parts are said to be connected to them, just as the house of
Saturn meets the Sun and the Moon.

Sometimes activities of the human body are among the compared features.
The author of the Ghdya lists correspondences between the human body and the
universe in the following way: “Man’s walking is like the movement of the plan¬
ets and his sitting like their halting. His movement backwards is like the decline
of the planets and his death like their burning.” (Ghdya: 44) In the Rasa 'il, a simi¬
lar passage goes into more detail in paralleling the human activities with astro¬
nomical phenomena:

His movements and acts are like the movements and rotation of the heavenly bodies.

His birth and presence are like ascendants and his death and absence like descendants.

When his affairs and states are right, it is like the rectitude of the heavenly bodies. His
staying away and fleeing is like their return. His illness and weakness are like their
burning; his halting and bewilderment are like their halting. The elevation of his posi¬
tion and his eminence are like the rise of a planet to its apogee and his descending in
his position and his lowness are like a planet’s descent to its perigee. His getting to¬
gether with his women is like conjunction. His communication is like the appulse of the
heavenly bodies and his separation is like their moving further away. (R II: 467)

In these comparisons, it is often hard to say whether the purpose is to describe
astronomical details or the human body. The same applies to a comparison of the
Ikhwan (R II: 465) between the nodes and the bodily humours: the happiness and
misfortune of the celestial bodies is said to be dependent on the nodes, which in
the Rasa’ll are known as the head 161 and the tail. They are described to be hidden
in their nature, but perceivable in their effects. In the human body, the humours
are said to have a similar position: theft balance and natures influence the acts of
the intellectual faculty and the faculty of speech. Similarly, the Sun and the Moon
cannot avoid the influence of the nodes. 162 This same idea is mentioned in one

In Butrus al-Bustam’s edition this appears as raqs, but from the context I read it as ra s.

The same idea appears in a comparison in the 49th epistle (R IV: 231-234), in which the
materials of the human body are also compared with the heavenly spheres, the apertures of

117

sentence in the Ghaya (46). In these comparisons, the holistic way of binding to¬
gether the spiritual and material well-being of man - and in the universe as a
whole - is emphasized, which is an essential feature of the humoral theory.

As noted previously, there are certain numbers which often occur in physio¬
logical comparisons. Sometimes the whole motivation for the analogy seems to be
to emphasize the importance of these numbers. In the 40th epistle (R III: 383), for
example, the Ikhwan mention that number twelve is the number of the apertures
of the human body as well as that of its members. A typical example of micro-
cosmic comparisons emphasizing certain numbers can also be found in the Ghaya
in a passage in which numbers occurring in the heavenly order are related to the
bodily structure:

The seven inner organs are like the seven heavenly bodies and in his head are seven
bones like the number of the seven weekdays. In his hack, he has 24 vertebrae like the
number of the hours of the night and day and 28 joints like the number of the mansions
of the Moon and the letters of the alphabet. In his stomach, there are as many intestines
as the number of days of the new moon. In him, there are 360 pulsating arteries and an
equal number of motionless ones like the days and nights of the year and the number of
degrees. He has the same number of natures as there are seasons in a year. {Ghaya: 44)

Another analogy in the Rasa’il (R II: 463-464) obviously highlighting numbers is
a comparison between the twelve apertures of the human body, which are said to
correspond to the zodiacal signs. 163 The only explanation given for this parallel¬
ism, apart from the number, is that just as in the human body the apertures are
divided into the left and right side of the body, so some of the signs are southern
and some northern. Exactly the same idea occurs in the Ghaya, with the repetition
of the statement often appearing in the comparisons of the Ikhwan as well that the
similarity is not only quantitative, but also qualitative. Nevertheless, the qualita¬
tive nature of correspondences is not always as clear for the reader as it is claimed
to be for the author, and, at times, the primary reason for choosing the entities for
comparison seems to be quantitative.

All these physiological comparisons fit well to Allers’s structural microcos-
mism. They concern relationships appearing in the human body and the corre¬
spondence between the microcosm and macrocosm concerns the structure the
parts of the two entities form. In some forms presented above - especially in the
ones examining the locations of the faculties of the human soul - some features of

the body with the signs of the zodiac, the faculties of man with the heavenly bodies and the
28 letters with the mansions of the moon.

In the epistle on magic (R IV: 415), the signs of the zodiac are also said to have places in
different parts of the human body, for instance, Aries in the hair, Leo in the mouth and the
tongue, and Capricorn in the stomach.

118

holistic microcosmism can also be perceived, but the main emphasis is on
straightforward structural analysis.

It is hardly possible to find any particular reason for the use of the explicit
physiological comparisons, but it seems that there are two main concentrations in
the analogies, which often appear in accordance with the macrocosm to which
man is being compared. The physiological comparisons examining the human
being as a reproduction of a city (or, at times, a house) concentrate on describing
the human body and, especially, the structures and hierarchies appearing in it.
Contrarily, the comparisons concerning the heavenly spheres could be seen as
descriptions which, instead of describing the human being in terms of the cosmos,
intend to reveal - vice versa - something of the universe in terms of man. This
latter point has already been affirmed by Conger:

It should be noted also that the Brethren have something more than a mere mention of
the universe as a ‘large man.' Most of the authors have estimated man in terms of the
universe, but have not gone far in describing the universe in terms of man; even where
the two have been set in parallel, the direction of emphasis has been chiefly toward
man rather than away from him. (Conger 1922: 51)

At times physiological comparisons seem to work simply as a stylistic feature of
the texts or, as was seen, for phrasing such particular things as the nobility of cer¬
tain numbers. Some of them, however, clearly intend to describe some particular
aspects of the idea of man. This is the case with the comparisons scrutinizing the
hierarchies appearing in the human body. They work as expressions of the views
concerning the importance of the different inner organs and partly also of the de¬
tails of their functions. Through comparisons the twofold nature of the human
being and the co-operation between these aspects is also expressed.

Sometimes the metaphysical meaning given to the comparisons may become
evident only in the light of the general scientific worldview. Scientific theories
may appear only as references in comparisons. An example of this can be seen
when comparing the details of the comparisons in two encyclopaedic works: one
difference between the comparison in the Rasa'il and that of the ‘Ajd’ib is the
reference to the bodily humours - an element which occurs in the comparison of
the Ikhwan, but is absent in al-QazwInl’s comparison. Sometimes the meaning of
a comparison is connected with a scientific view. As we saw in the last examples,
physiological comparisons may work as expressions of a commitment to astrolog¬
ical theory. Then their purpose may also be to draw attention to the dependence of
the human body, its actions and - on a more concrete level which is not explicitly
present in the texts - its health on the heavenly bodies.

119

4.3 SCIENTIFIC WORLDVIEW AND PHYSIOLOGICAL MICROCOSM

In many texts, the human body is presented as a microcosm in implicit forms,
often as part of the scientific worldview. In the mediaeval Islamic context, the
definition of science differed from modern definitions. The microcosmic idea is
particularly relevant in such disciplines as alchemy and astrology, which are now¬
adays regarded as “pseudo-scientific” or “semi-scientific” fields. 164 In mediaeval
times, however, these disciplines were sometimes classified as branches of the
natural or mathematical sciences, and sometimes listed under the categories of
magic or occult sciences. 165 In the following subsections, I will examine the rele¬
vance of the idea of the human being as a microcosm in the context of four sepa¬
rate branches of science: astronomical sciences, physiognomy, alchemy, and, last¬
ly, the theory of the bodily humours as it appears in music therapy. In addition to
examining the microcosm-macrocosm analogy as part of the theory of these sci¬
ences, I will give some general frames of their position among Islamic sciences
and possible influences in later scientific tradition. I do this in order to define the
role of microcosmism in the scientific worldview more generally. In some cases,
as will be seen, also the explicit comparisons presented above seem to have more
philosophical significance when they are examined in the framework of these the¬
ories.

4.3.1 Astronomical Disciplines

I will examine astronomical views and microcosmism in two contexts. Firstly, the
idea will be examined in the context of astrology. 166 Astrology has a prominent
role in various fields treated in the Rasa 'il and it is in many ways closely connect-

See note 12.

For example, al-Ghazall in his Tahafut al-falasifa (al-Ghazall (e): 162) includes both
alchemy and astrology in the natural sciences. In the Rasa 'il as well, alchemy is treated as a
natural science, while astrology forms part of astronomy. Some, like al-Farabi, in his Ihsd'
al- 'ulum, however, exclude alchemy from their classifications. For more on the classification
of sciences in the mediaeval Islamic world, see, e.g., Nasr 1968: 59-64.

The relationship between astrological theory and astronomy was complex. Many recognized
astronomers also wrote on astrology, and scholars in various fields often earned their living
working as astrologers for the ruling elite. Especially in the early stages of Islamic science,
astrology was not only respected for its practical value, but, as Gutas (1998: 108) points out,
it was seen by many scholars as the "mistress of all sciences”. Nevertheless, scientists often
made a distinction between "serious” astronomy and astrology. They seldom commented on
astrology in the same works in which they developed planetary theory or other branches of
mathematical astronomy. As will be seen in the case of astrological embryology, although it
was condemned by most mainstream physicists, the fact that they did comment on astrology
in their works indicates that the theory must have had its sympathizers and could not be
ignored.

120

ed with microcosmism. The basic idea is found summarized in the epistle on mag¬
ic ( R IV: 386): “all that happens in the world of man and in the created earth is
under the rule of the spheres and the command of the heavens.” Astrological em¬
bryology is chosen as an example of the astrological sciences, because the Ikhwan
were essential in the later development and diffusion of the theory. Further, a
more mathematical dimension of astronomy will be approached and the focus will
be on the aesthetic theory of human proportions, which were thought to reflect
heavenly proportions. The appearance of the latter in the Rasa'il is, to my
knowledge, unique in Islamic thought and, for this reason, I will examine its pos¬
sible influence in later aesthetics in more detail.

4.3.1.1 Astrological Embryology

In mediaeval Islamic thought, astrological theory was seen as having an influence
already in the first steps of the development of a human individual. By astrologi¬
cal embryology, I mean the idea that the development of an embryo in each month
of pregnancy is subject to the influence of one of the heavenly bodies. This was
important especially in astrological writings and philosophy, but it also appears in
some mainstream medical works. Astrological embryology is clearly connected
with the microcosm-macrocosm analogy, particularly in its physiological as¬
pect. 167

Although some sources for Islamic astrological embryology can, according to
Widengren (1980: 312), be found in Indo-Iranian cosmological writings, the first
complete presentations of the theory are assumed to appear in the mediaeval Is¬
lamic intellectual tradition. According to Burnett (1990: 97-100), apart from some
brief references, 168 astrological embryology is not treated in Antiquity. Embryolo¬
gy is studied in ancient sources as well, but its premises are different from those in
the Islamic era. It is, for instance, already considered a fact in the ancient sources
that the embryo born in its seventh month may survive, while one born during the
eighth month of pregnancy does not usually survive. Burnett (1990: 96-98) points
out that in Antiquity this was explained by the numero logical uniqueness of num¬
ber seven. Numerological explanation was replaced in Islamic Hermetic texts by
astrological theory.

The theory appears in its complete form in such early Arabic Hermetic texts
as Kitdb al-istamatls and Sirr al-khalTqa. In addition to these two works, Burnett
(1990: 98-100) mentions the Rasa 'il among the early sources for astrological em-

I have examined astrological embryology previously in Svard and Nokso-Koivisto
forthcoming 2014.

According to Burnett (1990: 97), the closest reference to this theory in Antiquity is found in
Plato’s Republic, in which the five planets are said to be related to the development of a
human embryo, each of them affecting it twice for a period of one month.

121

bryology in the Islamic tradition. The Rasd’il was influenced by earlier works
and, through it, the theory was transmitted to later astrological tradition and sub¬
sequently to medical writings. 169 One of the background views for the relationship
between the development of the human embryo and heavenly spheres can, accord¬
ing to Burnett, be found in the description of Adam’s creation in Kitdb al-
istamatls; here it is said that the planetary powers, from the moon to Saturn, create
the “bodily souls” of the human being: bone soul, sinew soul, flesh soul, marrow
soul, blood soul, skin soul and hair soul. In the same work, the spiritual powers of
the planets are also aligned with the substances of the human body in the follow¬
ing order: hail' with Saturn, blood with Jupiter and Mars, fat with the Sun, saliva
with Mercury and the brain-matter with the Moon.

In later Islamic thought, astrological embryology plays an important role in
texts influenced by the Hermetic tradition, but it is not alien to mainstream scien¬
tists either. Baffioni (1997) compares the embryo logical views appearing in the
Sirr, the Rasa 'il and two tenth-century medical texts, al-Qurtubl’s Kitdb khalq al-
jariin wa tadbir al-habdld wa’l-mawludln and al-MajusI’s Kitdb kamil as-sind'a
at-tibbTya. She indicates that, in the medical texts, astrological embryology is con¬
trasted with scientific views, while in the other two the astrological interpretation
of the theory forms part of the prevailing worldview.

I will examine the appearance of the theory in four texts: the Sirr, the Rasa ’il,
al-QazwInl’s ' Ajd’ib and in Tusi’s Rawda. As noted above, Baffioni (1997) has
studied the relation between the Sirr and the Rasd’il. It has previously been
acknowledged by Widengren (1980: 308) that the Rasd’il is a possible source for
the embryology of al-QazwInl. 170 I agree with Burnett (1990: 97) that astrological
embryology stands in a salient role in the system of the Sirr, where the treatment
of the theory is located at the end of the work (512-522, VI 31.1-31.12) forming
its climax. References to it appear elsewhere in the work as well. In the Rasa ’il,
astrological embryology is referred to in many contexts (e.g., W: 132), but the
25th epistle (R II: 417-455) is dedicated to this topic. Al-QazwInl ((a): 322-328)
reserves some pages for it in the chapter on the human being, and TusI (47-48)
handles it as part of his description of the human body.

The origin of the human being in a drop ( nutfa ) appears as a starting point in
all treatments of astrological embryology. According to Widengren (1980: 303-
308), this was already present in the Indo-Iranian tradition. He connects it closely

169 ... .

The similarity in the embryological views of the Sirr and the Rasa ’il has also heen
acknowledged by Ursula Weisser (1980: 230).

170

Ruska (1913) has studied the similarities between the Ikhwan and al-Qazwim in this respect.
Widengren (1980: 308) also mentions the Ikhwan as a possible source for the embryological
ideas of IsmaTlI thinker Nasir-e Khosrow (d. after 1072). The transmission of astrological
embryology between the Ikhwan and TusI has not, to my knowledge, been previously
studied.

122

with the microcosm-macrocosm analogy, claiming that “further evidence in Irani¬
an speculation about the remarkable correspondence between earth as macrocos¬
mos and man as microcosmos lies in the fact that both were created from wa¬
ter.” 171 Though the origin of everything in a drop is mentioned, for instance, in the
Sirr (402, V 3.2), the origin of specifically the human being in a drop is of more
interest to my study. The latter is also mentioned in the Qur’an. Hence, the drop is
referred to by many who do not go into the details of astrological embryology
(e.g., al-Ghazall (f): 9). In the texts developing the theory of astrological embryol¬
ogy, references to the drop also appear more often than other ideas of embryo logi¬
cal theory: it is mentioned several times in the Sirr (e.g., 434, VI 2.7) as well as in
the Rasd’il (e.g., R III: 195, IV: 83), in which it also occurs in the context of mi-
crocosmism in the epistle On the Saying of the Wise that the World is a Large
Man (III: 223).

The nature of the drop is discussed in more detail in some passages on em¬
bryology. The Rasd’il says that at the beginning it is a drop of sperm surrounded
by menstrual blood and when the heat of the sperm is mixed with the moisture of
blood it turns into a foetus (‘ alaqa). Baffioni (2008a: 108) remarks that the au¬
thors of the Rasa il abandon the Hippocratic notion of female sperm forming the
embryo when it mixes with male sperm, adopting instead the Aristotelian doc¬
trine, which replaces female sperm with menstrual blood. In the ' Ajd’ib (al-
Qazwlnl (a): 322), however, we can find this again, and al-QazwInl says that fe¬
male and male sperm are mixed together. 17- There is a difference between these
views, for instance, as to what extent the drop includes the form of the future em¬
bryo. As Baffioni (1997: 429) points out, a difference between the Ikhwan and the
Sirr is that, according to the author of the Sirr (512, VI 31.1), “in the nut fa of the
human being, there is the whole shape ( shakl) and the whole form {sura) of the
human being.” Hence, if there are defects in the newborn, these are already pre¬
sent in the nut fa. This idea cannot be found in the Rasa ’il.

During the first month of pregnancy, the foetus is under the influence of Sat¬
urn. The author of the Sirr says that the eyes, mouth and ears are formed in the
second month, which falls under the dominance of Jupiter. In the Rasa 'il and the
Rawda, this is said to take place much later (in the fifth month). These texts also
claim that the foetus {'alaqa) transforms into the embryo {mudgha) during the
third month, under the influence of Mars. 17 "’

Widengren refers to water, but - at least in the Arabic context - there is no reason to assume
that nutfa would specifically mean a drop of water, rather than semen.

Widengren (1980: 310) refers to this as an Iranian view, and this appears in Hurufi texts as
well.

‘Alaqa and mudgha are words which already appear in the Qur an (e.g., 23:14).

123

According to all of these authors, the fourth month is an essential period in the
formation of the embryo. This is the time when “life starts to get apparent from
inside to outside,” as the author of the Sirr (517, VI 31.6) puts it. The Rasd'il and
TusT say that the animal spirit (ar-ruh al-hayawam) starts to work in the embryo
under the influence of the Sun and then an important development in the bodily
structure takes place. In the Sirr, it is said that the Sun makes the embryo much
more active in its movements than at earlier stages.

In all of these texts, the fifth month (of Venus) is connected with structural
development; the body parts are said to take their form during this month. The
Sirr explains that bones then become apparent and the material of the brain starts
to develop. Veins are also assumed to develop under the influence of Venus, but
the Rasa 'il claims that this has already happened under the influence of the Sun.
The opening of the apertures of the eyes, nostrils and ears during the fifth month
is described in exactly the same manner by the Rasa 'il and TusT. In the Rasa 'il, it
is added that at this stage the masculine embryo starts to resemble his mother and
the feminine embryo her father.

In the sixth month of pregnancy, the embryo enters the influence of Mercury;
all authors interpret this to mean an increase in its movement. The authors of the
Rasa 'il remark that the embryo starts to sense its whereabouts, is able to open its
mouth, and can sniff with its nose and move its tongue and lips. Sometimes it
sleeps, sometimes it is awake. All these details appear in the Rawda as well.

According to all of these texts, the body of the embryo achieves its comple¬
tion in the seventh month, and, if the baby is born during this month under the
lunar influence, it may survive. After completing the cycle of the seven planets,
the embryo re-enters the influence of Saturn in its eighth month. In the eight
month, again following the views presented in the Rasd’il, TusT (48, trans. Ba-
dakhchani) specifies that: “such a heaviness and gravity appears (in the embryo)
that if it is born in this month it usually will not survive, because the eight month
is that of the house of Pisces, 174 and Saturn in this position reduces all powers by
its coldness and dryness, and (the embryo) will die.” In the ninth month, however,
the astrological circumstances are again more beneficial when Jupiter begins to
dominate.

Even in this general overview, we can see that the differences between the
texts are small and the basic elements of embryological theory recur in all of
them. The Rasa 'il and the Rawda resemble each other in particular in relation to
specifics, although the Rasd’il treats the topic in a more exhaustive manner. Trac¬
ing more detailed influences between the texts would, however, require a pro¬
founder analysis.

174

The signs of the Zodiac were also part of embryological theory, although they do not play as

essential a role there as in some other areas of astrology.

124

Astrological embryology per se is an example of the analogy between the var¬
ious layers of reality and, for this reason, has relevance for the microcosm-
macrocosm analogy and its role in the idea of man. No explicit references to the
microcosm-macrocosm analogy appear in the texts’ treatment of astrological em¬
bryology. In the Rasd'il , the epistle on embryology precedes the one on the hu¬
man being as a microcosm. If the work is examined as a whole , 11 ~ it is thus close¬
ly connected with explicit microcosmism. All the other texts - the Sirr, the 'Ajd’ib
and the Rawda - also employ microcosmism in its other forms. This does not
mean that the authors would necessarily consider astrological embryology to have
anything to do with the other forms of the analogy, but it indicates that astrologi¬
cal embryology forms part of this idea of man.

When it comes to Allers’s classification of microcosmism, astrological views
can usually be seen as forms of structural analogy. This also seems to be the case
in the theory of astrological embryology: the whole analogy is based on corre¬
spondences between the human realm - in this case in the development of the
human embryo - and the heavenly bodies. The correspondences between these
levels examined by embryologists also relate to the dependence of the lower on
the higher; in this way, man is seen to be subordinate to the cosmic laws.

43.1.2 Aesthetics

The second theme concerning the heavenly spheres and the human physiology is
about the human body as an ideal of beauty. 176 What makes the human body ex¬
emplary is the perfect harmony of its mathematical proportions. In the Rasa 'il, the
excellent proportions ( an-nisba al-fddila) and their harmonic combinations are
said to form an ideal in many activities of the human being, including various ar¬
tistic disciplines. In this, the Ikhwan follow their times - mathematical propor¬
tions were accepted as an important factor defining beauty in mediaeval Islamic
thought. According to Doris Behrens-Abouseif:

The Arabs inherited from the Greeks the doctrine that proportion was the basis of beau¬
ty. This principle was adopted in all periods and in the context of various disciples, in
particular in the arts of calligraphy and music. The doctrine of proportion allowed the
formulation of universal aesthetic statements applicable to all arts as well as to human
beauty. (Behrens-Abouseif 1999: 37)

In their epistle on music, the Ikhwan produce a particularly detailed analysis of
proportionality. For the Ikhwan ( W: 129-130), the ideal mathematical proportions

The arrangement of the epistles in the work is, however, a disputed question and there is no
certainty as to whether the present order of the epistles is the original one (see, e.g., Hamdani
2008: 85-92).

I have examined this topic earlier in Nokso-Koivisto 2011a.

125

consist of ratios 2:1, 3:2, 4:3, 5:4 and 9:8, which, according to them, are based on
the diameters of the heavenly spheres (illustrated by Wright 2010: 20). These pro¬
portions are explained to appear not only in mundane music, which imitates the
sounds produced by the movements of the heavenly spheres, 177 but also at other
layers of reality. Their appearance has been explained in detail in calligraphy 178
and in human physiology.

The particular interest of the Ikhwan in the bodily aspect of man and its con¬
nection with the heavenly spheres can be seen in their detailed description of hu¬
man measurements. The exact information about the ideal proportions of the hu¬
man body is given by describing the ratio of a newborn baby’s span with its body
(W: 132-137 and Wright’s illustration, 2010: 22). The Ikhwan connect the notion
of the human body as the perfect shape with religious sources, and in the context
of the description of human measurements ( W : 132), there are two references to
the Qur’an: “We indeed created man in the fairest stature” (95:4) 179 and he “who
created thee and shaped thee and wrought thee in symmetry and composed thee
after what form he would” (82:7-8) 180 .

Although the human physiology is examined in detail and the whole treatment
of it lays emphasis on the exceptionality of the human form, the Ikhwan mention
that proportionality is not a unique characteristic of the human body, but also ap¬
pears in the bodies of other hayawdn :

According to this model, and by analogy, the anatomical structure of all animals will be
found to be proportionate; the parts of every form of every species (are proportionate)
to its body as a whole and proportionate to each other, either quantitatively, qualitative¬
ly, or both, being in no way deficient if they are unaffected by the harm that may come
to them at conception and during gestation from defects of the humours, alterations of
temperament, and inauspicious astrological conjunctions. (W: 136, trans. Wright, in W\

147)

Descriptions of human proportions have been familiar in various traditions
throughout intellectual history. Even so, the listing of the Ikhwan is, to my
knowledge, unique in the Islamic tradition. Proportions given in the Rasd’il re¬
semble their predecessors in Antiquity and the mediaeval European canons of
human proportions (Shiloah 1964: 172-173). Although the treatise of the Ikhwan
is more detailed and differs in some of its features from Leonardo da Vinci’s Vi-

On the theory of music and the microcosm-macrocosm analogy, see 5.4.2.

The examination of the measurements of the letters may, in addition to defining the ideals in
the work of a calligrapher, imply the mythological position of letters, not simply the
mundane art of calligraphy. For more on letter mysticism in the Rasa'il, see note 159 and
Ebstein and Sviri 2011.

Laqad khalaqna al-insana fi ahsani taqwim.

Alladln khalaqaka fasawwaka fa 'adalaka fi ayyi suratin md sha 'a rakkabaka.

126

truvian man, the similarity between these two passages on human measurements
is, as Wright (2010: 22) remarks, “inescapable, and is not just an unavoidable
consequence of a common anatomy: there is a direct echo of the Vitruvius’s cir¬
cle, centred upon the navel, that touches the outstretched fingers and toes, and of
the square within which height equals extended arms.”

Erwin Panofsky (1970: 106) notes, however, two unique characteristics in the
description of the Ikhwan. One is the use of span as a measurement. In declara¬
tions of the human proportions, the unit of measurement is usually the length of
the face or nose. Another, and more significant, factor, which distinguishes the
Ikhwan from other theorists of human measurements, is that the proportions are
described for the body of a newborn. This is, according to Panofsky, done in order
to emphasize the cosmological importance of the theory. In the epistle on music,
the child is said to emerge from the womb in the perfect form. A reference to the
perfect shape of a baby also appears in the philosophical sayings on music: “A
demonstration of that is the fact that newly bom young are more finely structured
and elegant in form and appearance because of their proximity in time to the com¬
pletion of the Creator’s work on them” (W: 177-178, trans. Wright, in W: 169).
The same is said to apply to flowers, which are more beautiful when they are
fresh.

The nature of the epistle on music also implies that the primary motivation for
the examination of the human measurements in the Rasa’il is cosmological. The
proportions are a manifestation of cosmic harmony, which is summarized in the
human body. Although microcosmism is not explicitly present in this context, the
human body as a replica of the mathematical ratios following the heavenly order
refers to the human body as a microcosm, which is a representation of the ideal
order. This brings the microcosm-macrocosm analogy into aesthetic discussion.
In, for instance, the philosophy of Antiquity, not to mention Renaissance thinkers,
this is not exceptional. In the Islamic discussion on aesthetics, however, the hu¬
man being as a microcosm has not received much attention and it seems that this
dimension was more extensively elaborated solely by the Ikhwan.

The practical role of the theory cannot be entirely excluded either. After de¬
fining the proportions of the baby, the Ikhwan (R I: 225) declare: “These corre¬
spondences and analogies are the ones, according to which the skilled artisans
make their works, sculptures, figures or paintings, well-proportioned in their
structure, combinations and harmony.” The proportions form an ideal to be imi¬
tated in various other fields as well. According to the Ikhwan, the right propor¬
tions are needed in medicines and cooking as well as for the goodness of human
character. In addition, examples of right proportions are manifested in the harmo¬
ny of music and beautiful paintings. A talented painter has to follow the balance
of colours otherwise he produces nothing but ugliness. In addition to the epistle on

127

music, the science of the proportions (ma 'rifatl 'ilm an-nasab) is examined in the
sixth epistle (I: 253), where it is considered from the perspective of music, arts,
medicine and cooking.

Even though the Ikhwan themselves seem to have intended the definition of
human proportions to serve also as a pragmatic tool in the creative work of an
artist, this was hardly the case in practice. According to Priscilla Soucek (1998:
539), there is no evidence of any practical value of the Ikhwan’s canon in Islamic
art. In the history of art, such canons have usually been used when defining the
portrayal of the human body in the arts. The canons were widely employed in an¬
cient art as well as in the Western tradition until the 15th century, when art was
significantly transformed and began to move in the direction of subjective expres¬
sion (Panofsky 1970: 136-137). The lack of any practical influence of the
Ikhwan’s canon is, however, difficult to prove because of the lack of material on
ideals of painting in the Islamic culture. A similar problem is confronted when the
practical value of human proportions is examined from the perspective of Islamic
architecture. There are few sources for Islamic mediaeval architectural ideals:
most of the writings on architecture treat only the technical aspects of building.

In bringing together the cosmological and practical dimensions in their repre¬
sentation of human proportions, the Ikhwan were ahead of their time. According
to Panofsky (1970: 118-120), during the Middle Ages the practical canons were
usually separated from those with cosmological significance. This changed in the
early Renaissance, when the new humanists combined the two aspects of the Vi-
tmvian man and attached the mystical significance of cosmic harmony to the artis¬
tic ideal. That is to say, the rational, Aristotelian theory was combined with the
mystical, Platonic interpretation of the topic.

When it comes to the canons of the proportions of the human body, no - di¬
rect or indirect - influence between the Rasa 'il and the Renaissance aesthetics has
been proved. Nonetheless, when it comes to proportionality as a criterion for
beauty in general, the Islamic theorists of beauty are acknowledged to have been
involved in the development which led to the European Renaissance. Panofsky
(1970: 119 n. 63) points out that there is reason to assume that one of the earliest
post-classicist Italian artists, Lorenzo Ghiberti (d. 1455), adopted the importance
of proportionality as an essential criterion for beauty from the writings of Ibn al-
Haytham (d. 1039).

It has been argued that Ibn al-Haytham was the first mediaeval thinker to de¬
fine beauty as a category on its own, independent of ethics, logic or theology.
Consequently, his definition of beauty has been characterized as an antecedent for
modern aesthetics. (Gonzalez 2001: 25) In Kitdb al-manazir (200-206), Ibn al-
Haytham defines the properties of the object perceived by the sense of sight as
producing a feeling of beauty in the soul of the perceiver. On some occasions,

128

colours cause objects to be considered beautiful, as when one observes flowers.
On the other hand, the moon looks more beautiful than the smaller heavenly bod¬
ies, because size is one of the properties causing beauty. After defining twenty
properties of this kind, Ibn al-Haytham mentions proportionality ( at-tanasub ) and
harmony ( al-i tilaf) as a separate category. In order for an eye to perceive beauty
in calligraphy or in any object consisting of different parts, harmonic proportion¬
ality is demanded. The proportionality of an object produces beauty distinct from
the beauty produced by any other property causing beauty. The human body is
one of the examples Ibn al-Haytham brings up of the objects which proportionali¬
ty makes look beautiful. In a beautiful man, the paired body parts, for example,
should correlate with each other in size: thus thin lips are more beautiful for a
small-mouthed person.

In Kitdb al-manazir, the terminology and the general emphasis are very dif¬
ferent from that of the Ikhwan and the cosmological dimension of the proportion¬
ality as a criterion of beauty is completely absent. Like in the Rasa il. Ibn al-
Haytham expresses interest in the human body and its proportionality and uses
calligraphy as an example like the Ikhwan also do. For the Ikhwan the aesthetic
ideal, as well as theft view of the human body and its measurements, are very
clearly cosmological, while Ibn al-Haytham takes part in the discussion primarily
from the perspective of the natural sciences. However, these two passages, quite
rare of their kind in Islamic thought, stand as examples of the expression of the
aesthetic ideal and its attachment with the idea of man.

The explicit comparisons give an interesting perspective on the proportionali¬
ty of the human body as a criterion for beauty. Since the Ikhwan do not refer to
the human measurements in the epistles dedicated to microcosmism, nor do they
use comparisons in the epistle on music, finding connections between the two has
to be based on delicate guesses. Considering explicit comparisons as expressions
of the aesthetic ideal might be an over-interpretation. The notion of the human
body as an ideal in architecture might have been familiar to the authors of the
Rasa il. Since, in the previous traditions, the presentation of a house as a macro¬
cosm is not even nearly as usual as a city-state or the heavenly spheres, earlier
architectural texts might have encouraged them to use the analogy between the
human body and a house. This, however, does not mean that the Ikhwan would
have given these comparisons similar meaning as the authors of the architectural
texts did.

One particular comparison is interesting from this perspective. In both Indian
and Iranian creation myths, there are allusions to the primordial man, who stands
in a posture of someone crucified and whose extended arms are equal in length to
the length of his body from head to toe (Widengren 1980: 300). In a comparison
between the human body and a city presented above in this chapter (see 4.2.2), the

129

Ikhwan describe the human being standing in this posture, but nothing is said
about the measurements of the body in this context. Naturally, the measurements
mentioned in the myth are in accordance with the reality as well as with the previ¬
ous Greek canons of human measurements and, hence, the Ikhwan would not have
needed this source to end up at this conclusion in their description of human
measurements. Nevertheless, taking into account that the Indo-Iranian influence is
well proved by Widengren in the microcosm-macrocosm analogy of the Ikhwan,
it is possible that the reference to the measurements of the human body in those
mythological sources worked as an inspiration for the Ikhwan to provide a de¬
tailed listing of these measurements. This would also explain the cosmological
emphasis in the examination of the human measurements of the Ikhwan.

4.3.2 Physiognomy

Physiognomy (firasa) is another field which brings together aesthetics and the
human body. In physiognomy, as it appears in the Islamic mediaeval context, it is
assumed that by examining the physical appearance of a human being his charac¬
ter or spiritual virtue can be revealed. The inner qualities of the human being were
thought to be manifested in the outer features, and the changes and development
of the soul were expected to become visible in physical appearance. In itself,
physiognomy does not have much to do with the microcosm-macrocosm analogy.
Physiognomic speculation has been related to it, for instance, when it appears to
be attached to astrology. 181 Nonetheless, this is not the case in any of the studied
texts. Ibn 'Arab!, however, reserves the whole eighth chapter of the TadbTrdt (Ibn
‘ArabI: 161-176) to open up the secrets of physiognomy and connects the theory
with the idea of man as the microcosm.

The position of physiognomy among Islamic sciences was not clear. It is not
mentioned in most of the classifications of the sciences, and some authors place it
among divinatory and occult sciences. In its most classical sense - as the interpre¬
tation of personal characteristics from some immutable bodily features - physiog¬
nomy usually appears in medical literature. Like their Greek predecessors, Islamic

Mladen Popovic examines physiognomy and astrology in the Judaism of the Dead Sea
Scrolls and the Hellenistic Early Roman period. According to him (Popovic 2006: 69),
physiognomy was already practised by the Babylonians, but in their hands the art was merely
an instrument for prediction. In the Graeco-Roman period, the central goal of physiognomy
was to define the character of a man and, at that time, the astrological aspect was attached to
the discipline. Popovic (2006: 89) notes that "[w]hile physiognomies remained a distinct art
unto itself, evident by the transmission of the treatises, it was at the same time, from the
Hellenistic period onwards, incorporated by astrology. The connection between planets and
the signs of the zodiac on the one hand and the human person and body on the other hand
served as another illustration of the sympathy between macro and microcosmos.”

130

sages did connect the theory of the bodily humours with physiognomy, but in the
Islamic tradition physiognomy was also employed outside the sphere of medi¬
cine. 18 " Religious and mystical meaning is emphasized in Islamic interpretations
of the field. Physiognomy was thought to be facilitated by God and practising it
was attributed to pious persons. Hence, stories of physiognomic capacities are
often attached to well-known Sufis. Sufis, in particular, highly valued physiog¬
nomy and al-Qushayrl describes physiognomy in his Epistle as “the emanation of
light illuminating the heart”. In its broadest sense, the discipline can be under¬
stood as interpreting something inner from the outer aspect of the thing, and, for
this, as Hoyland points out, such concepts as zdhir and hdtin were of importance
in physiognomic speculation. (Hoyland 2007: 241-259)

The eighth chapter of the TadbTrdt is entitled On the Religions and Intellectu¬
al Physiognomy (FT al-firdsa ash-shar 'Tyya wa ’l-hikmiyya) and at the beginning
the field is described as “God’s generosity to you, lightened with the divine
lights” (162). The title of the chapter already lays emphasis on Ibn ‘Arabl’s two¬
fold understanding of physiognomy: its traditional branch is referred to as intel¬
lectual physiognomy ( al-firdsa al-hikmiyya) and distinguished from that connect¬
ed to religious law (al-firdsa ash-shar'Tyya).

The first part of the chapter (Ibn ‘ArabI: 163-168) is dedicated to the field as
it is understood by sages, i.e. intellectual physiognomy. He explains how the inner
virtues are reflected in the outer appearance of the person: in Muhammad one
could see the outer signs of his inner perfection. For this, one should be careful in
choosing the person who is to rule a kingdom. He should be neither too tall nor
too short, his hair should be dark and absolutely not reddish. His eyes should be
black, because blue eyes are a sign of bad character, his face should be of optimal
shape and one should not see “arrogance in his eyes” (163). The author lists vari¬
ous good and bad signs in the outer appearance of a person. The analysis is ex¬
tended to all areas and many outer characteristics of man are given meaning: ex¬
cessive hail' on the chest and belly is a sign of a savage nature, a lack of under¬
standing and a love of injustice; the person with a good character has white skin
with only a little yellow in it and so on. The optimal shape of the head, the face
and the body parts are defined, and all the oddities are seen as signs of bad charac-

Among the physiognomic methods in Islamic texts, Hoyland (2007: 247-257) mentions
interpreting the expressions and movements of a human being on particular occasions as
extremely common. In Islamic culture gender-specific features appear as distinguished
characteristics of the physiognomic theories. Hoyland assumes the reason for this to be the
strict segregation of the sexes in the mediaeval Islamic culture, which, in my understanding,
was the case in, for instance, contemporary Christian/European culture as well. A popular
form of physiognomy was to seek similarities in physical characteristics between animals
and human beings, and, by means of them, compare the behaviour and inner reality of
species. This is explicitly present in Kitab al-hayawan of al-Jahiz.

131

ter. In addition to physical characteristics, inner virtue is reflected, for instance, in
the voice of a man.

Such expressions of the outer beauty of man, although they are explained to
be a consequence of inner beauty, give a rather superficial image of the idea of
man, and Ibn ‘Arab! cannot accept it as such. After the systematic listing and ex¬
planation how the nature of the human spirit can be seen in his physical appear¬
ance, the author turns to the physiognomy of religious scholars, al-firasa ash-
shar'iyya, which he characterizes as more important (Ibn ‘ArabI: 170). In this
context, Ibn ‘ArabI describes the veils which prevent us from seeing reality. At
the end of the chapter, it is noted that ugliness or beauty can only be seen and in¬
terpreted through religious learning: the reality is only understood by those who
understand the religious truth (175). For Ibn ‘ArabI physiognomy seems to be a
discipline of the learned ones and its real secrets are not as evident as they seem to
be for the practitioners in the field in its pure intellectual form. 183

Throughout Ibn ‘Arabl’s examination of intellectual physiognomy the medi¬
um is seen as the ideal and all extremities are defined as expressions of something
suspicious. Only occasionally are positive characteristics connected to extremities
and even then they are only in the secondary position in the hierarchy of virtues:
although a big nose is a sign of bravery, the optimal equilibrium is found in men
with a straight nose of medium length and thickness, who are typically intellectual
and understanding (Ibn ‘ArabI: 165-166). This ideal middle way is explained by
the cosmological position of the human being: the essence of the human spirit (ar-
ruh al-insanf) is to be a mediator ( mutawassita ) between the intellect and matter.
In some people one of these two dominates. The ideal is a balance of the two,
which can also be seen in the physical appearance of the human being. (168—
169) 184

Although microcosmic comparisons or other explicit references to microcos-
mism do not appear in Ibn ‘Arabl’s account of physiognomy, the basis of the the¬
ory with the middle position as an ideal is explicitly connected with elementaristic
microcosmism in the form in which man is seen as the middle being bringing to¬
gether the material and spir itual. The physiognomic theory as presented by Ibn
‘ArabI can be seen as an interesting example of the way the topic of man as the
middle being, already discussed in Chapter 3, is taken to the level of human phys¬
iology and aesthetic ideals are connected with the human body. Although for Ibn
‘ArabI the perfection of a human being is clearly connected with the spiritual, in

Al-Ghazall refers briefly to physiognomy in ‘Aja’ib al-qalb ((c): 729), denying its basic idea.
According to him: “You may see a person with a beautiful external appearance, while he is
abominable in his heart and hideous in his inner life, the world of sense abounds in
deception" (trans. Skellie, in al-Ghazall (d): 114).

In expressing this middle position, Ibn 'ArabI employs light metaphor, see 3.3.2.

132

this context we again see that the middle position is defined as the ideal (as noted
above, see 3.3.2).

4.3.3 Alchemy

Alchemical theory is based on a knowledge of the transformation of beings. Me¬
diaeval Islamic alchemy has in its background the view that every physical body
is constituted of mercury and sulphur, which are placed at the centre of the uni¬
verse and out of which the four elements develop. 1X5 Because every being is ulti¬
mately constituted of the same elements, transmutation between the species is
possible. According to Paola Carusi (2005: 171, 2002: 55), the transformation
appears in two forms in tenth-century Arabic alchemy: horizontally, through gen¬
eration and corruption (kawn wa fasd), when the transformation takes place by
means of a reaction between two individuals, and vertically, by means of compo¬
sition ( tarkTb ) or decomposition, when the transformation is about one individual,
which through change in its equilibrium descends or ascends in the hierarchy of
beings. These two are not, however, exclusive, and in some works, like in Miftah
al-hikma, both appear.

Both of the two branches appear in the Rasa 'il . 1S6 On the one hand, the
Ikhwan write in the 19th epistle (R II: 91) on minerals that there are four kinds of
minerals. An influential factor in this is the soil, which defines the value of the
mineral. In addition to soil, the maturing process is essential: the more time the
maturing takes, the more precious is the result. Salts and alum need only one year
or less of maturation, but the most precious minerals, like diamonds, need a num¬
ber of years. This and the often appearing notion of the middle beings between the
species (see 3.4.1) bring to mind the horizontal theory proposed by Carusi.

On the other hand, the Ikhwan continuously emphasize that the differences
between beings are due to theft form (sura), not to the matter they are constituted
of (e.g., R II: 6). Thus, especially as regards theft idea of man, the Ikhwan seem to
follow the vertical theory, although, for instance, in theft embryological views
they do not clearly express it. The theory based on the concept of ideal equilibri¬
um and proportionality is present in various contexts in the Rasa 'il (see, e.g., R II:
252-253). It is not, however, treated in detail in the context of minerals. The ma¬
jor concern of the Ikhwan in the context of alchemy seems to be simply to under-

This theory, which was unknown to ancient authors, often appears in Arabic alchemical
sources. In addition to the Jdbirian corpus, Kraus (1942: 1) mentions among the texts
developing this theory Sirr al-khaliqa, Rasd'il Ikhwan as-Safa’ and al-Qazwinl’s 'Aja’ib al-
makhluqdt.

The position of alchemy in the Rasa ’il in general is examined by Marquet 2005.

133

stand the realm of minerals and - by means of this understanding - possibly refin¬
ing them.

In the Jabirian Kitab ar-rahma (137-143), perfection is acquired through the
balance (i 'tidal) of the natures of the very same being - in Carusi’s terms this
would be vertically. It is said that the human being only produces another human
being and the bird only produces another bird and the same applies to all animals:
they can only give birth to their own kind, and, in the same way, gold can only
come from gold. This indicates that the author sees transformation between spe¬
cies as impossible. Hence, perfection - be it that of minerals, animals or a human
being - is about the balance between the opposites appearing in each being, which
comes to being as a combination of the different natures. The weakest things are
those which have some forces which dominate over other forces, while the least
fragile ones have harmony between the opposing forces which appear in them:
they are the best balanced. The most opposites appear in animals and, especially,
in human beings. If the natures are in balance in the human being, he is healthy,
but if one of them starts to dominate over the other, he becomes sick. Thus, the
gravity of the illness is due to the extent to which one nature dominates over the
other. In the worst case, death takes place and the soul separates from the body.
The author adds that this is the way God has created man: if he had wanted man to
remain forever, he would have created him from a simple substance, not from four
natures: everything which is a combination of them perishes, including man, min¬
erals and the Large World. The things having least inconsistency of opposing
forces in them are such noble metals as gold and silver.

In the same work (Kitab ar-rahma : 147-149), the author disproves the theory
of the Elixir made of animal substances like blood, urine or saliva, and affirms
that: “[t]he ones who confirm these claims are ignorant of the requirements and
creation of the three realms, which are minerals ( hajar ), plants and animals, and
they are ignorant of the degrees of transformation of some substances to others.”
After explaining what the Elixir is not, the author explains where it can be found:

Know that the Mighty and Powerful (the Elixir), which has been praised and which has
been spoken of and which is guarded as a secret, must be like the microcosm (al- 'Slam
as-saghir), which is the human being and what is analogous with it. That means that
the operation (of preparing it) must include marriage, pregnancy, decomposition and
temporal duration, and the operation must have male and female participants and it
must contain growth before the Elixir is perfected. These conditions have to be exactly
like in the case of the human being.

In addition to bringing out the microcosm-macrocosm analogy, the author seems
to define what he finds essential in humanity. Later in the Kitab ar-rahma (158—
159), the author says that the Elixir is like a unitary human society with strong
individuals, who have identical natures, characters and desires: it is unified and
does not have opposition. Its meeting with another, badly organized and disunited

134

society is like the meeting of the Elixir with matter. This comparison in the con¬
text of the Elixir evokes the city-state comparisons in the description of an ideal
human being, which will be treated in Chapter 5. City-state comparisons are typi¬
cal examples of sociological holistic microcosmism and are usually employed in
expressing the ideal of the human being. The use of the analogy in the description
of the Elixir is exceptional, but it is also connected to its traditional form, since
the Elixir is also paralleled with the human being.

The idea of man as the microcosm is explicitly mentioned several times in the
Jabirian corpus. When the microcosmic man is compared with the Elixir and es¬
pecially when the sociological aspect of the analogy is involved, it can be seen
that this microcosmic position is a feature of a human being who has achieved the
perfect balance of opposing forces within him. Thus, as we can see, although no
deeper allegorical meanings would be read from the writings of the field, 187 the
perfection of the human being is relevant from the perspective of alchemical theo¬
ry.

This perfection is, however, essentially different from the other views on hu¬
man perfection in my study. Carusi (1993: 121) examines the dualism concerning
two opposites, coincidentia oppositonim, which, according to her, might be the
core of all alchemical philosophy. In the case of the dualism in Miftdh al-hikma,
she accentuates that it is in no way religious, Zoroastrian or Gnostic. It is a philo¬
sophical idea, which, according to Carusi (1993: 133), does not have ethical nu¬
ances: it is not about the moral perfection of a human being. Instead, as Carusi
emphasizes in the discussion on dualism and perfection in this context, the interest
is primarily on the physical perspective. In the previous chapter on the treatment
of the animal side of man, we saw that microcosmism appears in the context of
ethics in many texts, including al-Ghazall’s, the Ikhwan’s and al-Qazwinfs writ¬
ings. In the next chapter, on the other hand, it will be seen that the analogy is often
used in more detailed descriptions of human perfection, especially in the mystical
tradition, and then the ethical side is in many cases emphasized. The physical ap¬
proach distinguishes alchemical theory from all the other philosophical traditions
examining the microcosmic idea and human perfection.

The Jabirian alchemical theory represented the most elaborate chemistry of its
day. Later chemistry was a successor to this theoiy, which was developed already
in the texts attributed to Jabir ibn Hayyan. Nonetheless, in Jabirian alchemy there
are also philosophical elements that were abandoned by such critical scientists as
Abu Bakr Muhammad ibn Zakariyya ar-RazI (d. 925), who is often considered to
have been the father of practical chemistry. Some views appearing in the Jabirian

Alchemy, naturally, also works as a metaphor for the mystical development of the human
soul, as it does, for instance, in the name of al-Ghazall’s treatise Alchemy of Happiness. This,
however, is not relevant in this context because of its purely spiritual nature.

135

Corpus were seen as marginal in the later mediaeval Islamic scientific tradition, if
not at the actual time of their composition. Gerard Heym (1937-1938: 186-187)
mentions, however, that although ar-RazT’s works on chemistry concentrated on
more practical topics, his worldview was actually very similar to that expressed in
the Jabirian Corpus and included such Isma lll concepts as “a belief in the inter¬
action of the macrocosmos and the microcosmos”.

4.3.4 Music Therapy

In addition to the more marginal scientific theories, the microcosm-macrocosm
analogy appears to be attached to some generally accepted scientific theories of
the Middle Ages. From the perspective of physiological microcosmism, an im¬
portant example of this is the theory of the four bodily humours. The whole Gale-
nian physiology is constructed on the concept of equilibrium of the four bodily
humours, and this theory maintained its position in medical theory until modern
times. Differences between human beings in the Rasa 'il are explained to be due to
four factors: firstly, the balance of the bodily humours, secondly, the climate and
nature of the soil in the geographical area, thirdly, the education and guidance
given by parents and, fourthly, the influence of the celestial bodies (R I: 299, III:
401). In various other contexts as well, it can be seen that the bodily humours are
significant in the Ikhwan’s idea of man. An example of their close relationship
with microcosmism comes from music therapy. The Ikhwan do not treat medicine
as a separate discipline. Music therapy is the most profound treatment of humoral
theoiy in the work and is based on the fourfold division of man. Thus, I will first
consider some general features of the fourfold nature of man and the ways it is
treated in the corpus. Then I will examine music therapy as it appears in the
Ikhwan’s epistle on music. 188

4.3.4.1 Fours in Man

All divisions of things into four in mediaeval thought relate to four as the number
of the elements. The human being forming a combination of the four natures
(tuba 7 ‘) of the elements is, on the other hand, the very basis for the idea of man.
This can be seen, for instance, in the Sirr. at the beginning of the chapter on the
creation of man (424-425, VI 1.2), it is said that the position of the human being
among the created is due to the balance of the elements in him: in bird, for in¬
stance, air is a dominating element and in fish it is water. In man, the elements
appear in the right proportions, which is later (500-501, VI 25) explained to be
the reason for the erect posture of the human being: in him the elements are ar-

I have examined the music therapy of the Ikhwan earlier in Nokso-Koivisto 2011a.

136

ranged in four layers, according to their heaviness - the higher ones are air and
fire and the lower ones earth and water. Is9

In the Rasa 'il, the correspondence between the four elements and the human
body appears as its own subchapter in the epistle On the Saying of the Wise that
the Human Being is a Microcosm. The elements are not only found in the human
body, but they correspond to particular parts of it:

Know that there are under the sphere of the Moon four elements ( arkan ), and they are
al-ummahdt, through which the generated beings ( muwalladdt ), meaning the animals,
plants and minerals, persist. In the same manner, there are four parts in the structure
of the body and these form the complete body: first the head, then the breast, then the
stomach and then the inner cavity until the end of the legs. These four correspond to the
elements: the head, because of the rays of eyesight and the movements of the senses,
corresponds to the element fire. The breast corresponds to the element air because of
breathing and inhaling the air. The stomach corresponds to the element water because
of its moistness. The inner cavity until the end of the legs corresponds to the element
earth, because the human being rests upon it like the three other elements rest upon the
earth and are around it. (R II: 466)

Like in the Sirr, the elements appear in the human body in the same order as they
are arranged in their own spheres within the sphere of the Moon.

Brief references to the four elements in man appear in all of the texts. For in¬
stance, in the Ghdya (44) the human being is said to be a combination of the deli¬
cacy of the substance and its thickness: in it, there is the thickness of earth, the
delicacy of air, the subtlety of fire and the coldness of water. In the Jdbirian Cor¬
pus the elements are often present since the whole Jabirian alchemy is based on
the natures of the four elements. This can be seen in the context of microcosmism
as well. For instance, in Kitdb ustuqus al-uss al-awwal (62), it is remarked that
God made the human being a microcosm for his body, which brings together the
four natures of the elements.

From the perspective of the human body, the most important fourfold division
is, however, the Galenic theory of bodily humours. In the TadbTrdt, Ibn ‘ArabI
(211-212) describes the correspondence between the four elements, the bodily
humours and the bodily faculties of man. 192 Ether is said to correspond to yellow
bile and digestion in general, air to blood and the attractive faculty, water to
phlegm and the excretory faculty and earth to black bile and the retentive faculty.
As can be seen, for some reason fire is not included in the comparison, but ether,
which is said to be hot and moist in its nature, is involved instead.

For more on this, see 3.4.1.

I read: “wa hiya al-ummahat allatl biha qiwam al-ashya’ al-muwalladat [[wa]] allatl hiya al-
hayawan...”.

A similar idea also appears in a comparison in the 49th epistle, see R IV: 234.

For more on the faculties of man, see 5.1.2.

137

Such simple parallelisms between the human being and the universe are obvi¬
ous examples of elementaristic microcosmism. The Ikhwan, however, go deeper
in the fourfold divisions of things and elaborate - based on these simple analogies
- a complicated system of tetrads ( murabba 'at), which has a profounder meaning
in association with the idea of man. It evidently falls into the category of structur¬
al microcosmism. The division of things into tetrads appears at various levels of
reality and references to it continuously occur in the Rasd’il. In the first epistle (I:
52-53), the Ikhwan list things that appear in fours: natures, elements, bodily hu¬
mours, seasons, directions, winds and mukawwanat (minerals, plants, animals and
human beings - the last exceptionally as its own group) 193 . In the epistle on as¬
tronomy (I: 116-117), they refer to the topic mentioning the seasons, the compass
points, the elements, their natures, humours and the winds. Four groups which
usually appear in these contexts are the elements, their natures, bodily humours
and seasons (see, e.g., R II: 78). In the epistle on music, the Ikhwan provide a par¬
ticularly detailed exposition of the tetrads and their significance.

43.4.2 Practical Interpretation of the Tetrads

The Influence of music on human health was widely accepted in mediaeval Islam¬
ic thought. It appears in many medical works, but the reasons why melodies affect
the body are rarely examined in the way that this is done by the authors of the
Rasd’il. 194 Although music therapy also appears in connection with other musical
theories, it is best understood in the frame of the cosmological definition of music
(see 5.4.2).

The lute is a special instrument in the mediaeval theory of music and the Is¬
lamic tradition contains many legends about its invention. Some of these parallel
the lute with the human body. In one, the invention of the instrument is attributed
to the biblical figure of Lamech. It is said that he made the first lute while griev¬
ing for the death of his child and constructed it based on the skeleton of the dead
son. (Shiloah 1995: 36-37) The Ikhwan regard the lute as an instrument of philos¬
ophers and believe that philosophers themselves invented it. In the Rasd ’il, it is
considered the noblest of instruments, and the lute has an important role not only
as an exemplary instrument in the theory of music, but also cosmologically.

The Ikhwan reserve a long passage ( W : 150-162) for the description of the
tetrads in their epistle on music. According to them, the seasons correspond to the
four elements. The arrangement of the strings of the lute from the lowest to the

On the human being as the fourth group of mukawwanat, see note 118.

Biirgel (1979: 36) mentions three medical texts, those of al-Muzaffar, al-Balkhi and Ibn
Hindu, which treat the theory but do not go into its reasons. According to him, the Ikhwan
are among the few to do this.

138

highest, on the other hand, follows the arrangement of the elements in their own
spheres under the sphere of the Moon. The highest string, zfr, which is the bottom
string in the playing position, corresponds to fire, the lowest one, bamm, to earth.
The correspondences form a system that includes various areas: 195

By analogy of this model, dear brother, if you scrutinize the conditions of the things
occurring ( mawjud) in nature and consider the attributes of existing (kd ’in) sensibilia,
you will find that they all fall into these four divisions, some concordant with each oth¬
er, others opposed to one another, as specified by God Almighty when He said, “and
We created pairs of all things”(Q. 51:49), and when He said "He created all the parts of
things that the earth produces, as well as themselves and other things they do not know
about” (Q. 36:36). (Trans. Wright, in W: 158-159)

Altogether, twenty-one things appear in the listing of the correspondences, includ¬
ing, among others, the signs of the zodiac, winds, tastes and the times of the day.
The tetrads have various levels that could be of interest for the idea of man. Sea¬
sons are compared with the four ages, the faculties of the human soul and moral
qualities. From the perspective of the human body, the most important level of the
tetrads is that of the bodily humours.

The tetrads in general are said to have a practical scientific value. In the epis¬
tle on music especially the correspondence between the bodily humours and tones
is obviously important from the perspective of the practical meaning of the theory.
Maintenance of a healthy equilibrium between the bodily humours and their stabi¬
lization by means of music clearly appears in the Rasd ’il: “Well-balanced and
well-measured sounds that stand in proportionate relationships help restore equi¬
librium to the blend of the humours” (W: 41-43, trans. Wright, in W: 97). On the
other hand, in the worst case the lack of harmony in music may cause death. 196
The system of correspondences between tunes and bodily humours offers the the¬
oretical basis for employing music as a method of healing.

According to the Ikhwan ( W : 97-98), each string of the lute affects one of the
bodily humours and strengthens its influence. The highest string strengthens yel¬
low bile and attenuates the power of phlegm. The second increases blood and at¬
tenuates black bile, the third increases the power of phlegm attenuating yellow
bile, while the fourth strengthens black bile and calms the passion of blood. In
practice, healing is said to happen by combining these tunes in rhythmic melodies,
which are played at the time of day or night which is contrary to that of the pre¬
vailing illness.

For a detailed illustration of the tetrads, see Shiloah 1964: 179-180.

Wright (W: 129 n. 190) points out that the positive effects are already mentioned by al-Kindl,
but al-Kindi does not mention the negative effects, which are acknowledged by the authors
of the Rasa 'il.

139

The cosmological theory of music had been summarized in a particular in¬
strument by earlier philosophers as well. The doctrine that a stringed instrument,
often a lyre, has a connection with the universe in its entirety was widely known
among the Pythagoreans (Conger 1922: 27). In the Islamic tradition, a parallelism
between the lute and the surrounding reality was already drawn by al-Kindl, who
develops a theory of the whole series of tetrads according to which the musical
modes bring out motions and strengthen virtues or vices. 197 A difference, noted
also by Wright (2010: 17 n. 21), between the Ikhwan and al-Kindl is, however,
that the Ikhwan - despite the important position of the lute in then theory - do not
construct a web of correspondences, as al-Kindl does, around the instrument.
Their tetrads are based on the four seasons, the lute being just one level of the
analogy.

Considering the general importance of the microcosm-macrocosm analogy in
their system, the use of the seasons as the starting point in the tetrads might reflect
the comprehensiveness of the system for the Ikhwan: although the tetrads are
placed in the epistle on music, analogical correspondences are emphasized to ap¬
ply at all layers of reality, not only in music. On the other hand, this might also be
an indication of Jabirian influence. In the Kitdb ar-rahma (143) it is explained that
all beings are divided into four natures. In “the Larger World” ( al - cilam al-akbar)
- meaning the “world of four natures or the world of the heavens and earths” - the
four natures are hotness, moistness, dryness and coldness, while in the human
being they are the bodily humours. The four seasons, on the other hand, are de¬
scribed as “the four natures ( at-tabd 7 j of the year”.

Thus, as Wright (2010: 15) mentions, the decision to choose the four-stringed
lute (not, e.g., the six-stringed, as al-Farabl does) as the basic instrument is made
to match other phenomena. Considering the importance of the number four in the
whole Rasa 'il (see 4.2.2), I find it inevitable, and it would be rather surprising to
find, for instance, the number six in this position, as it does not have any special
role in the rest of the work.

Even if the cosmological approach to music was quite marginal in the Islamic
mediaeval theory of music, the therapeutic value given to music maintained wide
acceptance in Islamic science throughout the Middle Ages. For example, in Ibn
SIna’s al-Qanun fi’t-tibb, the influence of music on the human soul is part of med¬
ical theory. Ibn STna’s views on the therapeutic value of music appeared in Islamic
as well as in European writings on medicine up until the 19th century (Shiloah
1995: 52).

When it comes to medicine, its position in the thought of the Ikhwan is a mys¬
tery in the current research: in spite of then quite extensive study encompassing

For al-Kindi’s theory of tetrads, see Biirgel 1988: 94-95.

140

the whole range of scientific disciplines, the authors of the Rasa 'il do not dedicate
any of their 52 epistles to medical sciences. This gives the passages touching upon
the topic an important role as indications of the medical views of the authors.
Human physiology, as it is treated in the contexts of physiological microcosmism,
includes references to medical theories: humoral theory often appears in the con¬
text of explicit physiological comparisons of the Ikhwan. Even more clearly,
however, the microcosm-macrocosm analogy prevails as the underlying theoiy in
the treatment of the tetrads in the epistle on music. A closer examination of the
medical notions appearing in the context of microcosmism in the Rasa 'il might
reveal something new concerning the Ikhwan’s interpretations of this scientific
discipline.

In astrological and alchemical texts as well as in music therapy, the corre¬
spondence between the microcosm and the macrocosm is not just about under¬
standing the system, but is also about influencing it by controlling the manifold
world order or at least predicting its actions. When a physiological correspond¬
ence takes place, the microcosmic idea often implies the influence between the
layers of reality: the layers do not just resemble each other but also depend on
each other. For instance, when the alchemical theory is understood as a science
aiming at manipulating reality more extensively - not at purifying the human be¬
ing - the human body is a way to explain and understand the correspondences
necessary in the process and, as such, the correspondence between man and the
macrocosm is primarily instrumental for the authors.

Although in its explicit forms physiological microcosmism is about the actual
state of men, some of these scientific views connect physiological microcosmism
- at least to some extent - to the potential aspect of the analogy as well. This is
especially clear in the case of alchemy, which is about the perfection of substanc¬
es at the physiological level. As will be seen, though, in the context of the spiritual
in the human being the potential aspect is given a much larger role.

It seems that the scientific theories presented above define the position of the
human being in the universe in two different ways. On the one hand, man is great¬
ly dependent on the universe around him, which is an obvious feature in all astro¬
logical theories. On the other hand, the way that alchemists see microcosmic man
corresponding with the most perfect substance clearly indicates that the human
being - as a reflection of reality as a whole - is the most central being among the
created. Another and even more extreme example of this adoration of the physio¬
logical aspect of man is the way the Ikhwan treat the perfect proportions in the
human body.

141

142

5. BECOMING A MICROCOSM

He who acquires a portion of knowledge, he himself becomes a world. (Hafez, d. 1389)

This verse contains some central perspectives on the microcosmic idea in its nor¬
mative form as it will be approached in this chapter. If in previous chapters it has
been mostly understood as an actual state of the human being - something that is
inevitably attached to the human being for his species or body - now the emphasis
will be on the microcosmic position as a potential state for a human being. Thus,
on the one hand, being (or becoming) a microcosm is seen as an ideal, the role
that should be taken or imitated, and, on the other hand, this ideal microcosm ap¬
pears in an individual human being. In this context, the focus is usually on the
spiritual faculties of a human being, which are often connected with knowledge.
For this reason, the main concern in this chapter will be on the non-corporeal -
that is to say spir itual - aspect of the human being.

In this chapter, my aim is to find out how microcosmism is employed in the
descriptions of the spiritual in man and such concepts related to it as the intellect,
the soul and the self, and, further, what these contexts reveal about the definition
of humanity. As regards normativity, the main question of this chapter is how the
authors express their views concerning the ideals of humanity and the process of
human perfection when microcosmism is involved.

The examination will be divided into four subsections. The first two concen¬
trate on the explicit forms of the analogy while the latter two represent mostly
implicit interpretations of it. The first subsection examines the use of the micro¬
cosmic idea in the definition of the “spiritual” in man, which is usually understood
as the real essence of humanity. Then the primary attention will be on different
divisions of the human soul into parts and faculties, which leads us to the ways the
inner and outer senses are examined in explicit comparisons. In the second sub¬
section, faculties of the soul and explicit spiritual comparisons remain a central
theme, and they will be approached according to the motivations they are given in
the texts concerning human perfection. They will be seen to have a role in ex¬
pressing the epistemological as well as ethical views of the authors. Epistemology
is of central significance in the third subsection, in which the analogy will be ex¬
amined, firstly, in the context of self-knowledge, secondly, as it appears in theo¬
ries of knowledge and, thirdly, as it is related to mystical perfection. When human
perfection is approached from the mystical perspective, sometimes the third level,
God, is included in the analogy. The divine aspect is also present in the last, fourth
subsection, in which the normative microcosmic idea will be examined from the

143

perspective of the activities of man. It will be seen that the role of a human being
as a creator also has a microcosmic dimension.

5.1 THE SPIRITUAL IN MAN AND THE MICROCOSMIC IDEA

Comparisons laying emphasis on the physiological aspect of the human being
often appear as listings of the correspondences between parts of the human body
and the surrounding reality, and their meaning seems to be restricted to describing
the wonderful structure and functions of the human organism as well as express¬
ing the holistic composition of the human being (see 4.2). In this chapter, explicit
comparisons will be examined from the perspective of the spiritual - or mental -
in the human being. Firstly, the general appearance of the soul 198 and its parts will
be examined in the comparisons of the Rasd’il. Secondly, the concentration will
be on the faculties of the human soul, and the theory of inner and outer senses will
be approached more broadly in the corpus.

5.1.1 Unity of the Soul

Most mediaeval Islamic thinkers follow the Aristotelian tripartite division of the
human soul into vegetative, animal and rational parts. In the Ikhwan’s epistle On
the Structure of the Body (R II: 386), the tasks of the tripartite soul are explained
in the following manner. 199 The vegetative soul ( an-nafs an-nabdtiyyd), which
includes inclinations (naza 'at) and desires ( shahawdt ), is located in the liver and
spreads its influence from it through the veins. The animal soul ( an-nafs al-
hayawdniyya) containing movement, natural disposition ( akhldq ) and senses is
located in the heart and emanates its influence through the arteries. The rational
soul ( an-nafs an-ndtiqa) encompasses conscious perception ( tamyTz ) and gnosis
(ma ‘rifa) and has its location in the brain, influencing other parts of the body
through the nerves." 00

I translate nafs as soul and ruh as spirit. Although these words in the Rasa ’it are often used in
a bit different manner, the Ikhwan themselves point out that ruh is synonymous with nafs (R
ill: 290 and IV: 104).

The Ikhwan do, however, present different divisions of souls as well. In the ninth epistle (R I:
311-315), they give a fivefold division, according to which, above human (al-insaniyya)
souls there are two levels of souls, angelic ( al-malakiyya ) and saintly ( al-qudsiyya) souls and
below the human soul, animal and vegetative souls.

These three parts of the human soul are treated in somewhat different ways elsewhere in the
Rasa ’it. Even in the same epistle, the vegetative soul is also called the growing soul ( an-nafs
an-ndmiva) and given the faculties of growth (numuw) and nourishment ( ghidha’). The
animal soul, on the other hand, is sometimes described as including movement ( naql ) instead

144

Although in the 30th epistle (R III: 68), the Ikhwan strongly condemn the way
some “people of science” (ahl al- ilni) refer to the three parts of the human soul as
different souls, again in the 23rd epistle (R II: 387) they divide it into even smaller
units referring to sight as the soul of the eye, hearing as the soul of the ear, smell
as the soul of the nose and taste as the soul of the tongue. This highlights a charac¬
teristic feature in the descriptions of the human soul in the Rasa’il: the Ikhwan
emphasize the human being as a psychophysical whole frequently defining the
locations of the faculties in the body. Earlier in the same epistle (R II: 381-382),
these souls are examined, with a slightly different division, paralleling them with
three “tribes” dwelling in a city: the appetitive ( shahwaniyya ) soul is like jinns,
the animal ( hayawaniyya ) soul like people and the rational ( ndtiqa ) soul like an¬
gels. 201

In spite of describing such divisions, the Ikhwan’s emphasis is on the soul as a
unity of these three aspects, which are hierarchical, but, however, parts of the
same soul. The vegetative, animal and rational souls are described as being like
the branches of the same tree, like rivers flowing from one spring, like men gener¬
ating from the same tribe and like three different professions of one man. When
the soul concentrates on nutrition or growing, it is called the growing soul, when it
concentrates on sensing and moving, it is called the animal soul, and when it con¬
centrates on thinking and making distinctions, it is called the rational soul.

The unity of different aspects of the soul is due to the fact that all souls are
seen as faculties or parts of the Universal Soul. The Universal Soul emanates its
domination ( hukm ) to all beings. This is a basic element in the ontological system
of the Ikhwan and it is often (e.g., R III: 213) affirmed with the Qur anic verse
“your creation and your upraising are but as a single soul” (31:28) 202 - the same
verse which appears in the context of the human archetype (see 3.2.1 n. 94). This
dominance at the level of the universe is found to correspond with the dominance
of the individual soul in the human organism: the faculties of a human soul spread
their influence throughout the whole human body, through all its parts and mem¬
bers. In the 49th epistle (R IV: 213), this is linked with the term microcosm and it
is said that the Universal Soul rules the heavenly bodies and makes them move
“like the human soul, which is the microcosm, moves all body parts and members
of the body”.

of a natural disposition and the gnosis related to the rational soul is also referred to as
reflection (fikr). (See, e.g., R II: 387)

The Ikhwan also use other kinds of anthropomorphic expressions in their descriptions
concerning the hierarchy between the three parts of the soul: the vegetative soul is described
as the servant of the animal soul, which, on the other hand, is the servant of the human soul
(e.g., R 111: 369).

On the translation of this verse, see note 94.

145

The domination of the body over the soul is also a prevailing theme in the
34th epistle On the Saying of the Wise that the World is a Large Man, and the
emanation of the domination of the soul is explained with comparisons between
various layers of reality (R III: 214-217). In one of these comparisons, different
classes of souls as faculties of the Universal Soul are described as a tree. A tree
stands as an example of the combined beings in a passage in the 14th epistle on
logic as well ( B : 134). There a tree - together with the human body and a city - is
mentioned as an example of the entities constituted of different substances op¬
posed to such things as stones, which are constituted of a single substance only. 203

After the tree comparison in the 34th epistle follows a comparison between
the emanation of the Universal Soul’s dominance to all beings and the sharVa
with its different obligations. The religious law has various rulings originating
from different sunnas and these sunnas have different ahkdm. The ahkam, then
again, have hudiid which differ from each other. All these, however, form one
religion, which is divided into various madhdhib. In the same manner, the Ikhwan
claim, the domination of the faculties of the Universal Soul diffuses, on the one
hand, to all beings of the universe - to heavenly bodies, elements, muwalladat,
murakkabdt and objects made by human hands - and, on the other hand, to differ¬
ent types of souls: to simple ( basTta ), generic ( jinsiyya ), specific ( naw'iyya ) and
individual ( shakhsiyya ) ones. The domination of the Soul is also compared with a
craftsman working in his forge using different instruments and tools. It is de¬
scribed as being like the rule of the lord of a house over different rooms and parts
of the house - just as the soul has its faculties, so too the lord has his servants and
helpers. 204 After that the king of a city-state is paralleled with the Soul: the city
has inns, streets, houses and everything that a city may have. It is ruled by one
king, who has various adjutants and servants, and his commands are diffused by
various mediators to all inhabitants of the city. Just as there are different types of
souls, so too there are different people in the city: learned and ignorant, men and
women, good and bad.

These comparisons may be seen as descriptions of the different abilities of in¬
dividual human souls and, as such, as declarations of the differences between
men. Taking into account the explanations attached to them, more than that, these
comparisons express the ontological system and the unity of all souls highlighting

Although the primary motivation for the appearance of the tree in this context seems to be
simply an example of the entity constituted of different parts, the tree is a familiar element in
microcosmism in many traditions. The Tree of Life is a crucial feature in Middle Eastern
mythology and has its microcosmic dimension (see 1.2.1). This quite universal idea is also
referred to in the Iranian microcosmism (see, e.g., Widengren 1980: 302). Al-Qazwlm ((a):
268) also refers to holy trees, which are like humans.

This comparison (R II: 384-385, see 4.1.2) is also of interest as a description of the
relationship between the body and the soul.

146

the twofold division prevailing in all beings: the soul with its many faculties and
the matter dominated by it. Although the Universal Soul is divided into different
parts and these parts are further divided into faculties, all are constituted of the
same unified spiritual substance and act as its aspects. Like the universe as a
whole, the human being is ruled by its manifold but unified spiritual aspect. More
detailed analysis of the hierarchies inside the sphere of the spiritual is examined in
comparisons which concentrate on activities and on the nature of the faculties
pertaining to the rational soul. In this case the emphasis of the comparisons is
more clearly on the human being.

5.1.2 Faculties of Man

Different activities of the human soul are explained as faculties of the soul. These
faculties are areas of responsibilities, some of which can be found in other living
creatures and some are particularly characteristic of the human soul. Division of
the faculties sometimes occurs in accordance with the tripartite division of the
soul, sometimes it is clearly independent of that division. The faculties of the hu¬
man soul often appear in explicit spiritual comparisons. An overview of these
comparisons given in this subsection and the ways the faculties of the soul appear
in them will serve as an introduction to this theme, which recurs in the compari¬
sons later in this chapter. Before tackling the use of the microcosm-macrocosm
analogy in this context, some basic differences in approaches to the faculties in
the texts will be clarified.

5.1.2.1 Categories of the Faculties

Like in the Aristotelian tradition, in Islamic thought various faculties of the hu¬
man being are often divided into outer ( zahir ), or corporeal ( jismani ), and inner
(bdtin ), or spiritual (ruhdnt), senses ( hawdss ) or faculties ( quwwa , pi. quwa). Fac¬
ulties pertaining to these categories vary, but the basic idea is usually that the out¬
er senses include the five senses (sight, hearing, touch, taste and smell) and the
inner senses refer to post-sensational faculties. These are often constituted of dif¬
ferent kinds of combinations of common sense ( al-hiss al-mushtarak ), imagina¬
tive faculty (i al-quwwa al-mutakhayyila/al-quwwa al-musawwira/al-khaydl), esti¬
mative faculty ( al-quwwa al-wahmiyya/al-wahm), faculty of reflection ( al-quwwa
al-mutafakkira/al-fikr/at-tafakkur) and memory ( al-quwwa al-hafiza/al-hifz),
sometimes accompanied by recollection ( adh-dhdkira ). The number of the inner
faculties varies between three and seven: sometimes several faculties are defined

147

as different aspects of a single faculty, sometimes one is divided into many sepa¬
rate faculties. 205

Often the faculties are defined as having physical locations in the body. The
outer senses are attached to the body parts relevant to them, for instance, sight
through the eyes and touch through the hands. The inner senses are located in
three chambers of the brain: 206 usually faculties receiving and gathering infor¬
mation from the senses, including common sense and imaginative faculty, are
placed in the front ventricle; those processing these images and distinguishing the
false from the true ones, such as estimation and reflection, in the middle cavity;
and memory preserving the images and recollection recalling them from the past
are located at the back of the brain.

In addition to these two classes of senses, among the faculties of the human
being often appear different bodily activities, such as digestion and attraction, and
the incentive or motive faculties of anger ( al-ghadabiyya ) and desire ( ash -
shahwaniyya). Their positions in the classifications vary.

Of the texts treated in this study, classifications of the human faculties appear¬
ing in the works of al-Ghazall resemble this basic division with some varia¬
tions. 207 The Ikhwan’s definition of the human faculties has some particular fea¬
tures which differ from it. The most important concerns the categories of the fac¬
ulties. In the epistle On the Saying of the Wise that the Human Being is a Micro¬
cosm ( R II: 464), the Ikhwan list as the seven corporeal faculties those which con¬
trol the bodily activities: attractive ( al-jddhiba ), retentive ( al-mdsika ), digestive
(i al-hadima ), excretory ( ad-ddfi'a ), nutritive ( al-ghddhiya ), growing ( an-namiya)
and productive (al-musawwira ). 20s These they contrast with seven spiritual facul¬
ties, into which the Ikhwan include the five senses and, in addition to these, the
faculty of speech ( al-quwwa an-natiqa ) and intellectual faculty {al-quwwa al-
dqila). Places of the senses are explained to be in the relevant parts of the human

Among others, Ibn Slna does not have a uniform way of combining the faculties, but he uses
various terms and listings of the inner senses, which usually include as independent faculties
or aspects of the faculties the common sense, imaginative faculty (e.g., khayat) compositive
human imagination ( mufakkira ), which is contrasted to compositive animal imagination
( mutakhayyila ) (as Wolfson translates these two terms), estimation ( wahm , but also zann),
memory and recollection (see Wolfson 1935a: 444).

Wolfson (1935a: 441—443) points out that physicists employed a tripartite division of
perception based on the three chambers of the brain. Maimonides, for instance, includes in
the inner senses only imagination, reflection ( tafakkur ) and understanding ( tafahhum ), which
are - as concerns their contents - in accordance with Aristotle’s and Galen’s division,
although they name the last one memory.

In Skellie’s introduction to the translation of Aja’ib al-qalb , there is a good illustration of
the divisions of the inner senses in six works of al-Ghazall (see Skellie 2010: xxiv-xxv).

These faculties are also said to be the faculties of the vegetative soul, which work as servants
for the animal soul (R II: 156-158).

148

body: sight in the eyes, smell in the nostrils and touch in the hands. Speech is lo¬
cated in the throat and intellect in the middle of the brain.

Later in the same epistle, the Ikhwan (R II: 471) refer to five other faculties of
the human soul, which are the imaginative faculty located in the front part of the
brain; the faculty of reflection in the middle of the brain; memory at the back of
the brain; the faculty of speech in the throat and the faculty “through which the
soul produces writing and all the other crafts”, which refers to the productive fac¬
ulty ( al-quwwa as-sind'iyya, sometimes al-quwwa al-musawwira) in the hands.
The tasks of these faculties are defined in the following way:

When the imaginative faculty receives the images (rusurri) of sensible objects from the
senses it perceives them and forwards them in order to collect them together. Then it
sends them further to the faculty of reflection, whose location is in the middle of the
brain, for it to distinguish one from the other and to recognize the true ones from the
false ones, the correct from the erroneous and the disadvantageous from the beneficial.

Then the faculty of reflection sends them to the memory, which is located in the back
of the brain, for it to preserve them until they are needed. Then, when the faculty of
speech receives these preserved images, it expresses them with clarity to the faculty of
hearing of those present in that time. (R II: 471—472)

The task of receiving and combining the information gathered by the senses,
which in the Aristotelian division is given to common sense, is defined by the
Ikhwan as a task of the imaginative faculty. The other absent faculty is the estima¬
tive faculty, whose role is included in the tasks of the reflective faculty. The fifth,
the productive faculty (al-quwwa as-sind'iyya), is defined in the following way:

The productive faculty, when it wants to write down the words, makes letters with a
pen, writes them on various materials and within scrolls so that the knowledge is pre¬
served - written down and it remains a benefit from those who have passed away to
those who come after them, a tradition of the earlier generations to the later ones and a
speech of those absent to those present. This is a great blessing from God, be he exalt¬
ed, to the human being, as it is said in his Book: “Recite: In the Name of thy Lord who
created, created Man of a blood-clot. Recite: And thy Lord is the Most Generous, who
taught by the Pen, taught Man that he knew not.” (Q. 96:1-5)" (R 11: 472)

According to Wolfson (1935b: 78-82), the Ikhwan’s system is a combination of
Galenic and Stoic classifications of the inner senses. It was adapted by them most
likely through John of Damascus’s texts. In them, the tasks of the faculties were
not defined in detail, which explains some peculiarities in the division of the
Ikhwan. The most important of these concerns al-quwwa an-natiqa, which ap¬
pears in the Rasa 'il with an ambivalent meaning: sometimes it evidently refers to
the rational faculty, sometimes it is regarded as the faculty of speech like in the
citation above. Often the meaning can be read from the context, such as the loca¬
tion given to the faculty. A literal understanding of the faculties also led the

209

Although Butrus al-Bustam’s reading muftdan is possible, I read muqayyadan.

149

Ikhwan to interpret the Stoic reproductive faculty as production in general, not in
its original meaning referring to procreation.

As we can see, the Ikhwan define three “levels” of faculties, which are partly
overlapping. Although this is not explicitly present in this context, these three
levels may be loosely related to the tripartite division of the soul. 210 In spite of
their otherwise remarkable interest in the epistemological perspective of the hu¬
man being, the corporeal activities (digestion, growth, etc.) are included in the
division, which - once again - lays emphasis on the physiological aspect of the
human being. 2 " The incentive faculties do not appear in this classification alt¬
hough they are referred to in many explicit comparisons. Often desire is connect¬
ed with the vegetative soul, as was seen above, and anger with the animal soul
(see, e.g., R I: 313 and III: 68).

Al-Qazwlnl ((a): 355-364) classifies the faculties in a detailed manner and
pays a great deal of attention to the matter. In the 'Ajd ’ib the faculties are divided
into four classes (anwd‘), which are further divided into various types ( asndf ),
parts ( aqsdm ) or kinds {durub). Unlike the Ikhwan, al-QazwInl uses the term outer
senses ( al-quwa az-zdhira ) to refer to the five regular senses (touch, smell, sight,
hearing and taste), which are, as in the Rasd’il , located mostly in their logical
places with the exception of smell, which instead of nostrils, is located at the front
side of the brain. Among the senses, al-QazwInl defines touch as a sense that can
be found in all animals and which distinguishes animals from plants.

The second class, inner senses ( al-quwa al-bdtina) fall into three types. The
first type, attending faculties ( al-quwa al-khddima ) are related to the functions of
the body and include the attractive, retentive, digestive and excretory faculties.
The second type, the mastering faculties {al-quwa al-makhduma), has to do with
activities of the body, which are the faculties of digestion, growth, reproduction
(i al-muwallida ) and production {al-musawwira). As can be seen, these two types
are the same as the seven corporeal faculties of the Ikhwan, with the addition of
the reproductive faculty, which was misunderstood by the Ikhwan." 12 The third
type of the inner faculties is the perceptive faculties {al-quwa al-mudrika), which

Then the corporeal faculties would be connected with the vegetative soul, the senses with the
animal soul and the post-sensational faculties with the human soul.

In addition to this example, the Ikhwan refer to other kinds of classifications of the faculties
as well. As an illustration, in the epistle on music {W\ 150-162), in their declaration on
tetrads appearing at various levels of reality, they refer to four natural faculties ( al-quwa at-
tabl'iyya), including the digestive, attractive, retentive and excretory faculties and the mental
faculties {al-quwa al-hayawdniyya), including imagination, reflection, recollection and
memory.

This might explain the difference in al-QazwInl’s and Ikhwan’s comparisons between the
human being and the city noted in 4.2.2, in which al-QazwInl refers to eight craftsmen rather
than seven, as in the Rasa 'il.

150

include the traditional inner senses: common sense, the imaginative faculty, re¬
flection, estimation and memory. These are located in different parts of the brain,
which are overall in accordance with the view of the Ikhwan. Common sense and
estimation - faculties which are not present in the description of the Rasa 'il - are
located in the front of the brain and in the middle of the brain.

Completely distinct from other divisions are the third and the fourth classes of
al-QazwInl. The third is that of agent faculties ( al-quwd al-muharrika), which are
divided into two: incentive faculties ( al-quwd al-bd'itha), including desire and
anger, and efficient faculties ( al-quwd al-fd 'ila), which are governed by the facul¬
ty of longing ( al-quwwa ash-shawqiyya). Al-QazwInl calls the fourth class the
intellectual faculties ( al-quwd al-'aqliyya ), which distinguish the human being
from other animals. Its first part is already present in a child and makes possible
the preparedness for theoretical concepts. The others develop at different stages of
life and have to do with different areas of knowledge: the second with logic, the
third with applied sciences, and the fourth and the highest one with the realities of
things.

SuhrawardT also uses the light metaphor in the description of the human facul¬
ties. In the Hikma ((a): 133-140), he calls the rational human soul “commanding
light” (mlr isfahbad), which is divided into five outer senses and their inner coun¬
terparts, of which he mentions common sense, estimation and the imaginative
faculty. SuhrawardT highlights that the faculties are not limited to five in number
and emphasizes their unity: “just as all the senses reduce to a single sense - com¬
mon sense - so, too, all the faculties reduce to a single faculty in the managing
light - its luminous essence, emanating by essence” (SuhrawardT (a): 139, trans.
Walbridge and Ziai). In addition to these, commanding light has various faculties.
Anger and desire are explained to appear in a commanding light attached to the
fortress of the human body because of the two forces prevailing in SuhrawardT’s
ontological system: the former is due to dominance ( qahr ), the latter to love
(mahabba ). 213 The faculties of digestion, reproduction, growth, nutrition, attrac¬
tion, retention and excretion are needed in the corporeal fortress and, therefore,
they are clearly attached to the bodily aspect of the human being. In Haydkil an-
niir ((d): 5-6), SuhrawardT lists as inner senses common sense, imagination, re¬
flection, estimation and memory. Desire and anger are in this context represented
as faculties of the animal soul and the lower soul of the human being.

A classification completely distinct from others in the Arabic tradition is that
which appears in the Sirr (2,1 1.1.2). Here the inner senses are listed as reflection
(fikra), astuteness (fitna ), acumen ( dhakd ’), aspiration ( himma ) and conation

In Suhrawardi’s ontological system dominance and love are related to Neoplatonic concepts
of inner and outer activity.

151

(niyya). 2U Elsewhere in the Sirr (440, VI 2.11), the author refers to the intellectual
faculty, which is explicitly linked to divinity in the human being:

Concerning the divine wisdom particle ( al-juz ’ al-hakTmi al- ’ilahT) in the human being,
it is the intellectual faculty (quwwat al- ‘aql ), which differs from everything else in the
world, because there is no other thing in the world which would have intellect ( aql)
other than the human being. For this man is called the king of the world.

As noted in 3.3.1, the author of the Sirr (396-397, V 2.3) explains the middle po¬
sition of the human being with the faculties he has in common with other beings.
From animals, the human being has the bestial faculties of desire and anger as
well as movement and the senses. The faculties of plants found also in the human
being are absorbency ( an-ndshifa ), immovability ( ath-thdbita ), modification ( al-
mughayyira), excretion ( ad-ddfi'a ), nutrition ( al-ghidd ’) and parturition ( al-
wilada). Lastly, of the faculties of incorporeal beings the human being has reflec¬
tion ( tafakkur ), the pursuit of virtues ( ittibd' al-fadd ’H) and knowledge ( 7/m).

These divisions are, in one way or another, applications of the ancient theories
of inner and outer senses. In addition, in the epistle On the Opinion of Pythagore¬
ans regarding the Origin of the Intellectual Beings (R III: 195-196), the Ikhwan
give a description of the development of the human faculties. At the age of four,
when the rational soul takes over from the dominance of the animal soul in the
human being, the faculty of speech {al-quwwa an-ndtiqa) appears. It interprets the
names of sensible things and keeps developing until the age of fifteen. After that,
the intellectual faculty ( al-quwwa al- 'dqild), which distinguishes the meaning of
sensed things, appears and reaches its final form at the age of thirty. Then the fac¬
ulty of wisdom ( al-quwwa al-hikmiyya) starts to take over. Its main task is to per¬
ceive the meanings of intellectual beings. This faculty is completed at the age of
forty, after which the angelic faculty ( al-quwwa al-malakiyya) appears and devel¬
ops for ten years. From the age of fifty until the end of human life, the legislative
faculty ( al-quwwa an-namusiyya ) dominates. It prepares man for the thereafter
and for the separation of the body from the soul. If the human soul reaches perfec¬
tion before death, the faculty of ascension ( quwwat al-mi 'raj) enables the soul to
rise, and if not, the soul descends to the lowest of the low. 215 The Ikhwan also
refer to the 25th epistle on embryology. This connects the pre-natal development

On the relationship of this classification with that of Causa Causarum , see Wolfson 1935b:
84.

In the 45th epistle (R IV: 57), the Ikhwan describe a similar development naming only four
faculties. Here the faculty of speech seems to refer to eloquence, and it appears only at the
age of fifteen. The intellectual faculty is described in a similar manner as above, but the
legislative faculty is mentioned as the third faculty and it develops after the age of forty. The
angelic faculty, on the other hand, is said to be able to reach after the age of fifty. This kind
of division also appears in R IV: 174.

152

of a human being starting at the moment of conception with his later spiritual de¬
velopment along the same continuum. These spiritual faculties distinguishing the
human being from the other hayawan may be related to the fourth class in al-
Qazwlnl’s classification, which he refers to as the intellectual faculties. As for al-
Qazwlnl, their development - which is a particular feature of the human species -
is related to scientific knowledge, while the Ikhwan have a strong religious em¬
phasis in this context." 11 ’

5.1.2.2 Faculties and Explicit Comparisons

SuhrawardI ((a): 134) in the Hikma summarizes: “the human being has the frill
share of the faculties of animals and plants”. The idea that all the faculties, corpo¬
real as well as spiritual, appear in the human being is shared by many of our au¬
thors, and it includes an allusion to microcosmism as presented in 3.4.2. The mi¬
crocosm-macrocosm analogy is also used to express views concerning hierarchies
between the faculties, their locations and their tasks, which are the most often oc¬
curring themes in explicit spiritual comparisons.

Classifications of the faculties presented above draw a picture of a hierar¬
chical system between the faculties from the lowest, pertaining to the plants as
well, to the most noble, angelic faculties. This is highlighted in many microcos-
mic comparisons. Short references to such analogies appear in the Rasd ’iFs epis¬
tle on music ( W : 174-175) in which the hierarchies between the senses are exam¬
ined as they appear in the sayings of the wise. The 12th saying argues that sight is
superior to hearing, because “sight is like the day and hearing is like the night”.
The 13th, in contrast, claims that “hearing is better than sight because sight goes
forth to seek its percepts, serving them like slaves in order to reach them, whereas

In al-Halveti’s translation of Haydkil an-nur (SuhrawardI (f): 71-74), in the fourth haykal,
there is a passage which does not appear in Owjabi’s edition (SuhrawardI (d)). In it
SuhrawardI examines the development of the rational soul ( an-nafs an-natiqa), and in his
approach to the topic the flavour of mystical ethics is rather prominent. SuhrawardI states
that the rational soul evolves in seven stages, for the most part presenting the standard view
in Sufism and based on the terminology which appears in the Qur’an. First it is the inciting
soul (an-nafs al-ammdra) which is sinful and seeks satisfaction in earthly pleasures. After
that, it evolves into the self-reproaching soul (an-nafs at-lawwama ), which can already make
a distinction between right and wrong, feels guilt and repents and can even resist evil at
times. But only at its third stage as the inspired soul (an-nafs at-mulhama), can it truly follow
the voice of its conscience, which at this point of its development comes to it by inspiration.
The fourth stage is the peaceful soul ( an-nafs al-mutma ’inna) followed by the well-pleased
soul (an-nafs ar-radiya ), which submits to the will of God totally. Only in its sixth stage,
however, does the soul become identified with God’s will, totally losing its own desires. At
that stage, SuhrawardI refers to the soul as the well-pleasing ( al-mardiyya ). The seventh and
final stage of perfection is called the pure soul (an-nafs az-zakiyya) or the perfect soul (an-
nafs al-kamila). This development is explicitly linked with microcosmism: “This is the soul
of the perfect man, as man is meant to be, the microcosm of the whole universe, who
contains all that is in the universe” (74).

153

the percepts of hearing are brought to it in order to serve it as kings (are served)”
(trans. Wright, in W\ 167). 217 In the 30th epistle (R III: 124-125), the Ikhwan say
that the senses are related to the natures which appear in the World Body, which is
like a large man. Touch is related to the nature of earth, because man senses eve¬
rything through it, taste to the nature of water, because of the moistness of the
tongue and the mouth. Smell, on the other hand, has a special relationship with the
nature of ah' because its percepts are transmitted in the ah. Sight is related to the
nature of fire, because it needs light to perceive things. Again, hearing is given a
special role and described as related to the nature of the heavenly spheres, the
dwelling place of angels, because of the spiritual nature of its percepts.

Al-Ghazall describes the superiority of the inner senses over the outer ones in
the Mishkdt (al-Ghazall (b): 8), where he explains the relationship of the eye to
the rational faculty and notes that although the eye is light in its relation to other
things, it is darkness in relation to the intellectual faculty, or, al-Ghazall clarifies,
sight is one of intellect’s spies. The five senses are spies for the rational faculty,
which also has five spies in the realm of the unseen: the imaginative faculty, esti¬
mation, reflection, recollection and memory. Furthermore, the rational faculty is
said to have more hosts and servants in its own world. In al-Ghazall’s compari¬
sons - like in the first two passages from the Ikhwan - the two most frequently
occurring elements of comparisons treating the faculties of the human soul can be
seen: light metaphor and elements of the Platonic city-state comparison.

It is logical to compare the faculties of the soul - the cognitive faculties in
particular - with lights in the frame of the Neoplatonic ontological epistemology,
in which being as well as knowledge are described as light. -1N Light is also at¬
tached to cognition when the elements are examined in the human body and the
human head, where the cognitive faculties are usually considered to reside, is
compared with the highest of the elements, fire (see 4.3.4.1).

As lights, faculties are easily related to the heavenly lights or planets. The dis¬
tinction between the categories of the inner and outer senses is examined by the
Ikhwan (R II: 464-465) in a comparison in which the seven heavenly bodies are
described as parallel with the human faculties, which, like the heavenly bodies,
have their corporeal and spiritual aspects. 219 The seven bodily faculties (attraction.

In the 15th saying, this is also affirmed by the claim that “[m]ost percepts of sight are
physical, but all percepts of hearing are spiritual.” Suhrawardi ((a): 133) examines
hierarchies between the outer senses and places the objects of sight to the highest position,
mentioning, however, that touch is more important for animals: according to him, the sense
which is noblest is not necessarily the most important one. He also mentions the objects of
hearing as noble “in another respect”.

On the microcosmic idea and light as a metaphor of emanation see 3.3.2.

The commonly accepted notion in the mediaeval Islamic cosmology was that the souls of the
heavenly bodies are angels which cause their movement. In this way, each of them has both a

154

retention, nutrition, excretion, digestion, growth and production) have spiritual
equivalents, which are the five senses, speech and the intellectual faculty. These
spiritual faculties, on the other hand, find then' correspondence in the heavenly
bodies - the senses in the five planets, speech in the Moon and intellect in the
Sun. The five planets have two “houses” in the spheres, one in the domain of the
Sun and the other in the domain of the Moon. In a similar manner, each sense has
two physical locations one on each side of the body, sight in the eyes, hearing in
the ears, and so on. Locating the speech in the throat brings sounds, understood as
letters, into this:

The Moon takes its light from the Sun, when it runs through the 28 lunar mansions.

The faculty of speech takes the meanings for words from the intellect, while flowing
through the throat and expressing them by using the 28 consonants. The relationship
between the 28 consonants to the faculty of speech is similar to that of the 28 lunar
mansions to the Moon. (R II: 464M65)

This comparison appears in the Ghaya (46) as well. Just as in the Rasa 'il. the au¬
thor names the same spiritual and corporeal faculties and claims them to corre¬
spond to the heavenly bodies: “Like the Moon takes its light from the light of the
Sun in its 28 mansions, so does the faculty of speech take the meanings of the
beings from the intellectual faculty and speaks of them with the help of the 28
letters of the alphabet.” 2 " 0 Locations of the senses also seem to be compared with
planets in the Sirr (445-446, VI 6.2, see 4.2.1.2), in which “seven open doors of
the human head” are described to be like seven heavenly bodies guiding the hu¬
man being. The meaning of this comparison is not explained, but the open doors
most likely refer to the apertures of the head as locations of four senses, sight,
hearing, smell and taste.

Ibn ‘ ArabI (211) compares the different faculties of man with heavenly bodies
explaining at the same time some of then locations. The sphere of Saturn is com¬
pared to the faculty of recollection, which is located at the back of the brain, the
sphere of Jupiter to the intellectual faculty at the crown of the head, the sphere of
Mars to the anger in the liver. The sphere of the Sun is like the faculty of reflec¬
tion in the middle of the brain, Venus like the estimative faculty and the animal

spiritual and a material aspect. This has been seen by Conger (1922:51) as an example of the
microcosm-macrocosm analogy.

An interesting parallelism to this can be found in Ibn ‘Arabl’s thought. He compares the
Breath of the All-Merciful (nafas ar-rahmdn ), which gives life to the creation, with the
breath of the human being in the production of speech. Each being is presented as a word of
God. Like a speaker produces sounds, differing from each other according to the 28 places of
articulation ( makhraj ), so do the letters or realities of the cosmos manifest their creation from
the All-Merciful Breath. (See, e.g., Chittick 1989: 127-129)

155

spirit. Mercury like the imagination in the middle of the brain and the Moon like

the senses. 221

The main tendency in spiritual comparisons is anthropomorphism of the fac¬
ulties. Activities of the spiritual faculties are paralleled with activities of living
creatures, inhabitants and other actors dwelling in the bodily kingdom. 2 " 2 An ex¬
ample of its own kind among such comparisons in the Rasd’il is the one parallel¬
ing the senses with prophets, each of them introducing a new law. In this way, the
comparison describes the importance of the rational soul in acquiring knowledge:

What would be like the soul with its five senses - different things they perceive and all
those different kinds of species and particulars of different forms, varying shapes and
diverse constructions - if not the five prophets prominent in their determination? Their
sender is one, yet their laws are different. Under every law there are several rules, dif¬
ferent rulings and various sunnas. Under their rules, there are many nations the number
of which is only known to the Necessary Being ( al-wajib al-wujud), the One who is
one from all points of view. In the same way as these different communities return to
God and he is to judge the things in which they differ from each other, all things per¬
ceived by the senses return to the rational soul ( an-nafs an-natiqa), for it to distinguish
them from each other and to judge each reality and put them in their proper places. (R
11:470-471)

This comparison implicates that the five senses are placed under the rational soul
and form a part of the animal soul. It also expresses a clearly philosophical ap¬
proach to religion and even a pluralistic view to it. 2 " 3 God is rarely included in the
comparisons and even less by the Ikhwan, who usually concentrate on the created
world in their comparisons. 224 In this passage, however, He is paralleled with the
rational soul as the ultimate Judge who distinguishes truth from falsity.

Sometimes faculties or parts of the soul are simply paralleled with living crea¬
tures in general: “God made all the powers of the soul, flow in various parts of the
body. The difference of its members is similar to the flowing of the powers of
different types of angels, jinns, people and devils in the heavens and the earth,
from the highest ones to the lowest ones.” (R II: 463) The same idea occurs in a

Ibn 'ArabI (109) also parallels in a longer description of correspondences between the human
body and the macrocosm, the four winds (north, south, east and west) with four human
faculties: the attractive, retentive, digestive and excretory faculties.

Usually only the faculties of the human soul are described as living creatures while the
corporeal aspect of the human being - body parts and organs - are compared with the
material parts of a city-state. There are, however, exceptions, and sometimes the locations of
the senses, such as the eyes, the ears and the hands, are given the roles of servants, spies or
artisans. For further physiological comparisons, see especially 4.2.1.2.

The Ikhwan explain differences between religions, for instance, by comparing them with
differences between languages, which is a theme which occurs several times in the 31st
epistle. On the Ikhwan’s attitudes towards other religions, see de Callatay 2005b: 89-92.

For more on this, see 5.3.3.2 below.

156

city-state comparison appearing in both the Rasa ’il and the 'Ajd ’ib (see 4.2.2), in
which the tribes inhabiting the city - jinns, men and angels - are paralleled with
desire" 25 , animal and rational souls. In the TadbTrat, Ibn 'ArabI (109) compares
the incentive faculties and the needs of the human soul with animals. It is said that
like in the world there are Satans and beasts but also domesticated animals, in the
human being there are such things as the thirst for power and anger as well as the
need to eat, drink and marry.

When anthropomorphism of the faculties is treated in more detail, the facul¬
ties are usually examined as groups of people in different professions living in a
city. This is referred to in the epistle on the world as a large man (R III: 217),
where the Ikhwan provide a list of various inhabitants in the city and mention that
“in the same manner in the Large World there are various kinds of souls - simple
(basTta ), universal ( kulliyya ) and individual ( juz'iyya )”. In some descriptions of
the human soul, anthropomorphism of the faculties is mentioned in passing when
the faculties of the soul are presented as servants, adjutants or soldiers of higher
faculties, usually those of the intellectual faculty, and often in these contexts the
hierarchy and co-operation between the faculties is emphasized (e.g., R I: 316,
319-320, 327-328, II: 158). 226

As the name of the work indicates, Ibn ‘ ArabI’s TadbTrdt is built on the anal¬
ogy of the human body as a city. In the third chapter of the work entitled On the
Order and Structure of the City of the Body, which is Governed by the Vicegerent
(Ibn ‘ArabI: 131-138), Ibn ‘ArabI provides a long description of the dwelling
place of the vicegerent, who has previously been explained to be the human spirit.
God is said to have made a place for him to live, which he named the “body”. The
walls of the city are the four elements. In the centre, he made a place for the vice¬
gerent, which he named the “heart”. It is also referred to as his castle ( qasr ). He
built for the vicegerent an elevated promenade leading to the highest place of the
city, which was called the “brain” and made it openings, which are the ears, the
eyes, the nose and the mouth. In the centre of this, he built a storage, which was
called the “imaginative faculty”. Senses could consult this storage and bring more
goods into it. There was also another storehouse, that of the faculty of reflection.
In it, the goods, treasured in the fust one, are weighed and false ones are returned
to the storehouse of the imaginative faculty. He also built a third storehouse called
“memory”. As the minister of the brain he made intellect. In the city of the human

225

As was noted previously in this chapter (see 5.1.2), desire in the Rasa'il is defined as a
faculty of the vegetative soul.

~" 6 Similar anthropomorphic descriptions appear also, for instance, in the case of minerals and
elements. In the 19th epistle, (R II: 119) the element of fire is said to be “like the judge
among mineral substances, because it distinguishes what is true among them”. Concerning
the human faculties, anthropomorphic expressions are, however, much more common and
can be more easily connected with the wider context of comparisons.

157

being, there inhabits also the human soul, whose relationship with the human spir¬
it Ibn 'Arab! describes in al-Ghazall’s words: “the spirit is the soul’s husband and
the body is their child" (Ibn 'ArabI: 134). In the tenth chapter (185-186), it is ex¬
plained how the collection of tax is executed in the human kingdom. The eyes, the
ears, the tongue, the hands, the belly, the genitals and the feet are said to be serv¬
ants in the human kingdom. The hierarchy is described in the following way:
these servants are ruled by senses, which on the other hand have as then leader the
imagination. The imagination works under the rule of recollection, which is a
servant of reflection. The intellect is, again, described as the minister.

In the epistle on the structure of the body (R II: 386-391), the faculties and
their various activities functioning through the body are summarized as follows:

Know that the soul, which has the body as its dwelling place, has natural faculties
(i quwa tabi'iyya) and innate characteristics (akhlaq ghanziyya). These are scattered in
the members of the body like tribes and people living in the quarters of this city. These
faculties and characteristics have actions and movements scattered in the vessels of the
body. The channels of its joints are like the activities of the people living in their hous¬
es in that city, moving in its streets and working in marketplaces. (R II: 386)

After this, the three parts of the soul are further divided into 25 species and this
division is described in a long comparison in which types ( anwa' ) and activities
(, af'dl ) of the soul are equated with inhabitants of the city. Four of them are de¬
scribed as single ( mufrad); these are the four natures of the elements: hotness,
coldness, moistness and dryness. Among the other inhabitants of the city, the
Ikhwan mention the nobility, princes, leaders, judges and soldiers, but also lower
classes, such as foolish and ignorant people.

Three inhabitants are like masters ( arbdb ). The first of them is the faculty of
desire, whose activities without the leadership of the faculty of anger are like
those of women, adolescents and fools. The activities of anger, however, if it is
not supervised by the rational faculty, can be like those of the stupid and ignorant
people or even devil. The rational faculty, on the other hand, needs the intellect as
its master, since without it, the Ikhwan - revealing their sectarian interests -
claim: “it is like the activities of the learned ones and the reciters of the Qur’an,
who are in contradiction with each other in their different interpretations of the
principles of religion and split into various madhahib and readings, because they
are not led by the righteous Imam, who is the caliph of the prophets.”

Then the five senses are said to be like five traders in the city and the three
cognitive faculties, located in the brain, take care of the business within it. The
senses deliver goods to the imaginative faculty, which works as do the middle¬
men of merchants in the city. Reflection is like the salesmen and memory takes
care of the warehouses. The seven bodily faculties are like craftsmen, whose im¬
portant ability is co-operation: like the cotton ginner helps the carder, who works

158

together with the spinner co-operating with the weaver, who works closely with
the tailor, so do all these faculties of the human being work together in the human
body.

In the Rawda, TusI (42) summarizes this kind of analogy between the facul¬
ties of man and different classes of people:

The intellect and the soul are like the king and (his) minister. The external and internal
senses, the faculties of nutrition, attraction, retention, digestion, repulsion and all the
other faculties - which are, in their nature and functions, powers to move in ways par¬
ticular to each, and which are ultimately manifested in the body - are like pillars of the
state, such as physicians, scribes, and similarly the other guilds and classes, such as
chamberlains, deputies, guards, soldiers, servants, subjects, spies, postmen, messen¬
gers, craftsmen, merchants, and everyone else, whoever they may be, through whom
the welfare and prosperity of the city is perfected and the regulation of the city be¬
comes possible. (Trans. Badakhchani)

As usually in explicit comparisons, in all the city-state comparisons presented
above, the faculties are represented as subordinate to the leading faculty. In the
last comparison of the Ikhwan, the intellect has the role of the leader who is the
Imam - a figure who rarely appears in their comparisons. Intellect ( 'aql, some¬
times al-quwwa an-natiqa), however, is usually placed on the throne of the king
or some other governor of the human city. 227 When the soul - or the spirit like in
the TadbTrdt - is put in the leading position, the intellectual faculty or reflection is
often granted the seat as his minister, 2 ”* but in Tusl’s case, however, this is vice
versa. Sometimes the leader’s post is given to the faculty of reflection. 229 Other
faculties of the soul represent different groups of people from the ignorant to
salesmen, and, in this way, the various classes of workmen, sometimes the whole
of society, are included in the comparison.

Describing the faculties of the human soul through these microcosm-
macrocosm analogies gives an image of the spiritual in man constituting of vari¬
ous parts and abilities which ultimately form a unity. Most often microcosmism
highlights the division of reality into active rational and spiritual, i.e., living crea¬
tures, lights or planets, and the passive physiological, which is represented by ma¬
terial frames, such as the buildings of the city, or darkness. This is obviously rem¬
iniscent of the Neoplatonic and generally Platonic background of such analogies.

This was also seen in many physiological comparisons examined in Chapter 4, like in the
city-state comparisons of the Ghaya (44, see 4.2.1.2) and the Rasa 'il (R II: 384, see 4.2.1.2),
and in the comparison between man and the city of the Ikhwan and al-QazwIm (R II: 380-
382 and al-QazwIm (a): 354-355, see 4.2.2).

See, e.g., the comparison of the ‘Aja’ib ((a): 303-304, see 4.2.1.2 and 5.2.1) and the
comparison from the Rasa ’il (R II: 468, see 4.2.1.2) between the city and the body.

This is the case in R III: 242.

159

5.2 FACULTIES OF THE PERFECT MICROCOSM

Some spiritual comparisons explaining the hierarchies and functions of the human
faculties form descriptions or allegorical stories, which can be seen as expressions
of the ideal states or processes attached to a human being and his development.
Although ideals appear in various forms in the same texts, in the corpus explicit
spiritual comparisons mainly express epistemological, ethical or mystical ideals.

5.2.1 City-State Comparisons and the Process of Knowing

The comparisons referred to in the previous subsection and the short references to
the faculties of the soul can also be regarded from an epistemological perspective.
Especially when the highest of the human faculties, the cognitive faculties, occur
in city-state comparisons, they can be considered to be explanations of the process
of knowing.

The position of the senses in the process of acquiring knowledge is often ex¬
amined in comparisons. In the Rasd’il (R II: 468—470), the senses are described as
being for the soul like informants (ashdb al-akhbdr) to a king. It is said that hear¬
ing, whose location is in the ears, gives the information it receives to the faculty
of the imagination, which is to the soul like an informant to the king. Smell and
taste are described in this way as well. Sight, however, is like a spy for the king.

In the same epistle, the Ikhwan describe the relationship of the spiritual facul¬
ties with the body parts and senses connected to them in the following way:

Know, oh brother, that the human soul has five other faculties which are related to the
soul differently from the five (corporeal) faculties we described above. Their flowing in
the members of the body and their acts are unlike the acts of the corporeal faculties.

That is because these five faculties are like partners co-operating in the reception of the
forms of the perceived things, one from the other. Three of them are related to the soul
like boon companions to a king, always present at his court, cognisant with his secrets
and helping him in special tasks. (R II: 471)

Then the authors move on to the physical locations and functions of the spiritual
faculties:

One of these faculties is the imaginative faculty, which is located at the front of the
brain. The second is the faculty of reflection, which is located at the centre of the brain
and the third is the faculty of memory, whose place is in the back of the brain. One of
the (spiritual) faculties is related to the soul like the chamberlain or interpreter with the
king. This is the faculty of speech, which informs the soul of the meanings of what it
thinks concerning the sciences and other issues. Its channel is from the throat to the
tongue. And one of them is for the soul like the minister for the king, who helps the
king in governing the kingdom and ruling the people. This is the faculty through which
the soul produces writing and all the other crafts. Its place is in the hands and in the
fingers. These are the five faculties, which are like co-operators in what they receive of
the forms of known things. (R II: 471)

160

Speech is once again present among the faculties, and the intellect as such is not
treated at all. As we can see, the soul again appears as a king, whose minister is in
this comparison exceptionally said to be the productive faculty. The soul is seated
on the royal throne in al-QazwInl’s comparison as well, but in it the intellect acts
as the minister: 230

The soul is in the hody like the ruler in the kingdom. The faculties and members of the
body are servants of the king. [...] The intellectual faculty is like the sincere and rea¬
sonable minister. Desire is responsible for the food of other servants and the anger is
the commander of the police, who is a cunning and disloyal servant, but acts loyal to
the king. Anger’s counselling is lethal poison and it is always fighting the sincere min¬
ister. The imaginative faculty in the front side of the brain is like a post officer to
whom senses bring information. The faculty of memory, which resides in the back of
the brain, is like a treasurer and the tongue is like a translator. The five senses are its
spies, each of them commanded to inform on one of the regions: to the eyes has been
commanded the world of colours, to hearing the world of sounds, and so on. They are
informants on the areas on which they gather knowledge and then they transmit it to the
imagination, which is commander of the post and intelligence agency. He hands the in¬
formation over to the treasurer, who preserves it so that the soul may use when and
what it needs of it in the administration of his kingdom. (al-Qazwinl (a): 303-304)“^

As will be seen, for al-Ghazall, the main focus in the explicit comparisons is rare¬
ly on the description of epistemological ideals, but he also refers to this kind of
analogy in Aja ’ib al-qalb :

So the perceptive part of man dwells in the heart, as a king in the midst of the brain acts
as the master of his couriers, for the reports of sense perceptions are gathered therein.

The faculty of retentive memory, whose seat is the back of the brain, acts as his storage
keeper. The tongue is his interpreter and the active members of his body are his scribes.

The five senses act as his spies, and he makes each one of them responsible for a cer¬
tain domain. Thus he sets the eye over the world of colours, hearing over the world of
sounds, smell over the world of odours, and so on for the others. (al-Ghazall (c): 701—

702. trans. Skellie, in al-Ghazall (d): 26)

After this, it is mentioned that the information gathered by the senses is first taken
to the imagination, secondly, to the memory to be stored and then further to the
intellect. The king himself decides which pieces of knowledge will be used and
for what purposes: for good purposes or for bad, such as his enemies anger and
desire. The king himself is ultimately responsible for the fortune of his kingdom.

While the intellect, the rational soul or perception leads the processing of
knowledge, in the comparisons the other spiritual faculties stand as officers and

The beginning of this comparison concentrating on the physiological aspect of man is treated
in 4.2.1.2.

There are some interesting differences between the editions in this passage concerning the
tasks given to the faculties. In the new edition (al-Qazwinl (b): 252), the faculty of memory
is omitted and the imaginative faculty is described as the treasurer. The imagination, on the
other hand, is replaced by common sense.

161

hosts. They are placed in a hierarchy below the highest one and their different
relationships to each other are clear. Sometimes the acts and movements of the
body take the lower positions as inhabitants or servants in the city.

Although these comparisons clearly express the manifold nature of the soul
and the tasks of the faculties in processing knowledge, they also include the aspect
of the ideal in the process of perception. This is especially the case in the Rasa ’il,
in which knowledge is considered essential in human perfection.

These kinds of analogies which allude to the faculties of the human soul could
also be examined from the perspective of the commonwealth. In many cases, ex¬
cluding al-Farabl, Islamic philosophers seem, however, to consider the sociologi¬
cal approach as secondary. 232 Even though the viewpoint of the commonwealth
might provide some interesting insights into the philosophy of the Islamic thinkers
and to the Ikhwan as well, the focus of this study is on the role of man. ~ 33

5.2.2 Hosts of the Heart

If the Ikhwan’s concentration is on the epistemological perfection of a human
being and the explicit spiritual comparisons are harnessed for expressing ideals
attached to acquiring and processing knowledge, al-Ghazall’s intention is more
clearly to articulate the ethical side of the mystical perfection and the mastering
powers which possibly lead the soul astray. Thus, the incentive faculties of anger
and desire and their contradictory position in the human organism are in focus in
many of al-Ghazall’s comparisons.

In 'Ajd ’ib al-qalb, al-Ghazall examines the human faculties describing them
as the hosts" 34 of the heart. The basic idea is that “the heart is the king and the

A similar phenomenon has been recognized in earlier philosophy as well. Barkan (1975: 64)
remarks that in one of the dialogues treating Plato’s Republic, Socrates refers to the
sociological aspect as a secondary element in the Republic. Socrates starts by describing the
human body, and compares it with society, intending to construct a moral, personal ideal
rather than a political utopia. Hence, here as well, society as a reflection of the human body
is an instrument in expressing the ideal behaviour of an individual man.

It seems that when the Ikhwan use explicit comparisons primarily for expressing political or
sociological ideals, like in the 48th epistle (R IV: 171-173), they refer to the described city
with the term al-madinat al-fadila, used by al-Farabl as well. Baffioni (2002) compares the
Ikhwan’s conception of the perfect city with that of al-Farabl’s and finds the description of
the ideal city in the 48th epistle of the Rasa’il strongly Isma'ill in character, noting that
“even if scholars have sometimes denied the ‘Ismailism’ of the Ikhwan, no doubt can be cast
upon the Isma'TlT flavour” of this epistle. Baffioni (2002: 8) emphasizes the very Platonic
way the Ikhwan place the inhabitants of the perfect city within a hierarchy, which is
comprised of four levels, like the human soul has its vegetative, animal, human and angelic
faculties.

The Ikhwan do not use such comparisons, but they do refer to faculties as hosts, see, e.g., R
I: 316 and II: 468 (the latter translated in 4.2.1.2).

162

hosts are servants and helpers, and this is the meaning of the ‘host’ ( al-jund ).”
((c): 697) The number of these hosts is, according to al-Ghazall, only known to
God, which he derives from the Qur’an (74:31) 235 .

In the second chapter of ' Ajd’ib al-qalb ((c): 697-698), al-Ghazall presents
some distinctions between the hosts. One is made between the external and the
internal hosts. The former are perceivable by the eyes while the latter cannot be
seen. The external hosts are attached to the body parts. They are simply subju¬
gates to the heart, with no ability to rebel against it. Hence, their relationship to
the heart is explained to be like that of the angels - who unlike human beings have
no free will - to God.

Orders for the external hosts come from the internal hosts and these appear in
couples. One of the internal hosts is the host of desire, which the human being
needs, for instance, to procure food. It has external counterparts in the hands and
other members of the body, which do the practical, physical work in procuring
food. In order to drive away the destructive powers, the heart needs the internal
host of anger, which again has its external counterparts in hands, legs and other
members and, if needed, as reinforcement some instruments outside the body, like
weapons. Lastly, there is a host for gaining knowledge, which includes as its inner
part the five senses and as its external part the bodily members attached to them,
such as the eyes and the ears.

After this, the hosts are divided into three classes, which each have their own
impulses and locations in the body. The first one, including desire and anger, aims
at seeking desired things and driving away the undesired impulses. Its driving
force is the will ( irdda ). The second host, which executes the aims of the first by
the use of body parts and members, is located in the muscles and tendons. It is
driven by strength ( qudra ). The faculties pertaining to the third class are like spies
gathering information, and they are called knowledge (7 Ini) and perception
(idrdk). Perception has the outer aspect, which means senses which are attached to
the parts of the body, and the inner aspect is located in the brain. This inner aspect
consists of the cognitive faculties: the imaginative faculty, memory, common
sense, imagination, reflection, recollection and memory.

Usually the comparisons are images of the battle between two hosts of the
heart - the first host of knowledge ( al- 'ilm), wisdom ( al-hikma ) and reflection (at-
tafakkur), and the second host of anger ( al-ghadab ) and desire ( ash-shahwa) -
fighting over the governorship of the soul. The ideal state would be the peaceful
dominion of the first, but in the majority of human souls desire and anger do not
succumb to the domination of the higher parts of the soul. Even if all the hosts

235

wa-ma ya lamu junuda rabbika ilia huwa.

163

also have positive effects on the human being, especially the lower parts of the
soul often work against the purposes of the soul.

In the third chapter of ' Ajd’ib al-qalb, al-Ghazali ((c): 699) clarifies this battle
with three exemplary comparisons. The first resembles epistemological city-state
comparisons. It describes the human body as a kingdom, whose king is the soul.
The intellectual reflective faculty (, al-quwwa al- 'aqliyya al-mufakkira ) is the sin¬
cere advisor and intellectual minister. Its faculties and members are craftsmen and
businessmen of the city. Desire is the evil slave bringing food and supplies to the
city, anger and ardour (, al-hamiya ) the chiefs of police. Desire is described as evil,
which plays the role of a sincere advisor for the king aiming at lessening the pow¬
er of the other adjutants of the ruler. Such conspirators are totally absent in the
comparisons of the Ikhwan, but in al-QazwTnfs comparison (see 5.2.1) anger is in
a similar role.

In the second example, the body is again described as a kingdom, but the po¬
sition of the ruler is now given to the intellect, which al-Ghazall defines as per¬
ception ( mudrik ). Perceptive faculties ( al-quwd al-mudrika ) - meaning the exter¬
nal and the internal senses - are troops and helpers of the body. The members of
the body are inhabitants of the kingdom. Because the soul commanding evil, i.e.,
the lower soul of desire and anger, is like an enemy striving to destroy the city and
its inhabitants, the body turns into a battlefield and the soul into a place where
troops are stationed.

The thud example explains the same configuration through another kind of
analogy emphasizing the dichotomy between positive and negative effects of the
incentive faculties. The intellect is described as a horseman gone hunting, while
desire is his horse and anger is his hound. If desire and anger recognize then roles
as servants of the intellect, like the good horse and hound submit to their master,
they work together for the same goal. Otherwise, evil forces take over.

The comparisons of al-Ghazall are more realistic than idealistic: although the
ideal state is also explained, the basic idea is to describe the conflict between the
lower and the higher soul. In al-Ghazall’s comparisons, opposite forces that have
distinct interests concerning the state of the soul are in a prominent position. In
this way, although the comparisons transmit the model of the ideal way the facul¬
ties should work, they appear as descriptions of the state of the majority of human
beings.

A similar stance as in al-Ghazall’s comparisons can be found in Ibn ‘Arabl’s
TadbTrdt. At the end of the thud chapter (Ibn ‘ArabI: 138), which describes the
way the human kingdom works, it is said that because in the kingdom ruled by the
intellect there are different kinds of people, there is a continuous war between the
opposing forces. The armies of this war are described later in the work, for in¬
stance, in chapters 12-14. In the closing of the 14th chapter (Ibn ‘ArabI: 197), one

164

is advised to rule his armies and to be safe at the centre of the human kingdom,
namely in the heart.

5.2.3 A Journey through the Human Kingdom

In an allegorical story which appears in the sixth chapter of Suhrawardl’s Fi
haqTqat al- 'ishq (SuhrawardI (c): 64-68) 236 , a man is given advice about his jour¬
ney to a city in which he is to enter a three-storied castle, pass through five gates
and enter the woods where there are beasts. 237 SuhrawardI himself does not ex¬
plain the allegorical meaning of the story and without an anonymous commentary
of an early edition of the text its meaning would be left rather obscure. 238 Read
through the lenses of this early commentator, the story appears as a declaration of
the variety of the human faculties and an expression of the right path of a human
soul.

Firstly, the macrocosm of the universe is paralleled with the human micro¬
cosm. There are nine heavens, which are described as a nine-storied pavilion,
above which there is a cupola, “the City of the Soul”. As a guard of this city, there
is a young old man Jawed Khirad (Eternal Wisdom) who represents the Universal
Intellect. Whoever wants to reach that city needs to ask the way to the smaller
world, which is explained to be the microcosm of the human body. In the inhabit¬
ed part of the city, which is in the north, one finds a three-storied pavilion, which
is the brain. The cognitive faculties are found in these storeys: in the first, there is
Water, which stands for common sense, and File, which is the imagination
( khayal ). The one entering the city will encounter all the tricks and deceptions of
the imagination, and, for this, he is advised to urge his horse to the next storey.
There he faces Wind, which is the estimation which tries to lead one astray. An¬
other meeting takes place in the second storey, this time with Vapour, meaning
the imaginative faculty ( mutakhayyila ). Vapour is a two-faced creature just like its
counterpart among the cognitive faculties: it knows evil things such as necroman¬
cy and magic, but also beautiful things. In a similar manner, the imaginative facul¬
ty under the governance of the intellect is like an angel leading one to good things,
and it is called reflection. When it is ruled by deceitful estimation, however, it

All passages of the story cited in this subsection are translated by Thackston.

References to the microcosm-macrocosm analogy can be found in other chapters of this story
as well: in the last and 12th chapter there is a brief explicit physiological comparison in
which the human body is said to be like a city: the limbs are like streets, the veins like
aqueducts, the senses like craftsmen and the carnal soul like a cow that causes chaos in the
city. (SuhrawardI (c): 74-75)

The commentary along with an English translation of the story has been published by Spies
and Khatak (SuhrawardI (e)).

165

leads to bad things like devil does, and it is called imagination. For this, the one
entering the city is counselled to frighten those in the second storey with a sword,
which is an allegory for “the sword of knowledge”. In the third storey, the enterer
will encounter Earth, which is the memory of moderate nature, never misappro¬
priating things transmitted to it.

SuhrawardI first describes the cognitive faculties and their functions and only
after that the lower, outer senses. After these three storeys the visitor comes to
five gates, which are the five senses: sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch. The
first three gates have two doorways which refer to their locations, the fourth one
just one location, which is “wider than the other three. Inside is a pleasant spring
surrounded by a wall of pearl. In the middle of the spring is a divan that moves
and on it sits someone who is called the Taster.” (66-67) The Taster is able to
differentiate between the four “different things”, which in the commentary are
explained as elements with a mention of tastes being also four in number. Howev¬
er, it seems more probable that the tastes are exactly what SuhrawardI here alle¬
gorically refers to: the four tastes appear quite often in the groups of four paral¬
leled with the first thing appearing in fours, the elements (see 4.3.1). Touch,
which comprises all senses, is taken to a special position, as SuhrawardI also does
in the Hikma. The touch is explained to surround the whole city. This is due to its
location in the skin that is described as a carpet on which touch sits. In this con¬
text, Suhrawardl’s approach to the senses is overwhelmingly physiological and
the comparison emphasizes their physiological aspects and locations.

After this the visitor goes to the city forest, which stands as the heart. There
he sees fire, meaning, according to the commentary, the stomach, in which are
found the seven corporeal faculties. The visitor meets them there working by the
fire: the attractive faculty is sitting next to the fire cooking, digestion inflames the
fire, the retentive faculty waits for the food to be cooked and the excretory faculty
separates the good parts from the bad. The last one, described in the commentary
as growth, is represented as a “very tall person” who “stands by and seizes by the
ears those who have finished eating and pulls them up” (67).

In the forest of the heart there are two beasts, a lion and a boar, which stand
for the faculties of anger and desire. The boar is dedicated to stealing, eating and
drinking, paralleling the activities of desire, which is dedicated to seeking out
sexual pleasures, the lion to killing and tearing, which stands for the resistance
and vengeance exercised by anger. He who wanders in the kingdom is advised to
tie these beasts with the lasso of the intellect, after which he should make his
horse leap out of the nine barriers, leaving the microcosm, outside of which he
will find the spring of immortality.

If the comparisons presented in the previous subsections were primarily de¬
scriptions of the process of acquiring knowledge or ethical ideals, the place and

166

motivation of the allegorical story of SuhrawardT is not equally easy to define. It
has features of various kinds of comparisons. It examines, on the one hand, the
epistemological views. Like many comparisons concentrating on epistemology, it
sets as sentinel the intellect, which also occupies the key position in the salvation
of the soul. The story lists the faculties of the human soul dividing them into four
groups, proceeding from the inner to the outer senses, and then from the corporeal
to the incentive faculties. It also shows the dichotomised nature of many of them,
especially in the case of the inner senses. The description of the faculties is in ac¬
cordance with SuhrawardT’s description of the faculties in the Hikma. A notewor¬
thy difference with the epistemological comparisons treated above is that in
SuhrawardT’s story the relationship between the classes of faculties - then hierar¬
chies and co-operation with each other - is not clear or explained. By contrast, the
inner and outer senses and the corporeal faculties appear independently in differ¬
ent parts of the human kingdom. Thus, the holistic and hierarchical nature of the
human being, which is usually the prevailing theme in the epistemological com¬
parisons, is almost completely absent.

On the other hand, SuhrawardT’s story is a description of man as the micro¬
cosm and a story of the spiritual development of an individual man who passes
through all parts of his soul in order to reach freedom from these ties to the earth¬
ly. The last battle is located in the heart, and, as in al-GhazalT’s comparisons,
those needed to be put in their place are the incentive faculties. In SuhrawardTs
story the ideal leader of the process is the intellect. Unlike the other descriptions,
the intellect is located in the heart and is in this way treated separately from the
cognitive faculties described at the beginning of the story. The attachment of the
physical heart to the intellect is a characteristic in common with al-GhazalT and is
clearly a mystical feature.

In general, the wide use of explicit comparisons in descriptions of the human
soul and its faculties indicates that the spiritual in the human being is defined as a
holistic sum of these parts and faculties. As will be seen, such a definition of the
spiritual aspect of man is supported by the Ikhwan and - to some extent - by al-
GhazalT also in the context of self-knowledge. Concerning the definition of the
real essence of humanity in explicit comparisons and allegorical stories in general,
the ruler of the city-state is naturally an essential theme. This position is granted
most often either to the heart, the soul or the intellect. As for the Ikhwan, the vari¬
able leader’s role between the soul and the intellect is logical, since, in the light of
their epistemological views these terms otheiwise overlap. Al-QazwInT follows
the Ikhwan in his nominations of the ruler. Although it would be tempting to draw
a line in this between the epistemologically oriented and the mystic-ethical analo¬
gies, the rulers seem to change haphazardly. In al-GhazalT’s writings, the heart is

167

usually named as the ruler, but at times he places the intellect in this position,
which is also the case in SuhrawardT’s allegorical story.

The roles given to other faculties vary and the most important general find¬
ings have to do with the powers included in them. In the epistemological compari¬
sons the senses and cognitive faculties are almost always in the centre and even
the Ikhwan, who are not that clear about their categories concerning the faculties
of the human being, are seldom interested in the corporeal faculties of the human
being in these comparisons. Incentive faculties, which play a key role in ethically
oriented and mystical comparisons, appear only in side roles in the comparisons
of the Rasa 'il.

As against explicit physiological comparisons, the most important difference
is the use of comparisons to express the ideal state of a human being or a way to
achieve perfection. In some comparisons the educational aspect is central and es¬
pecially al-Ghazall employs Platonic comparisons to express his ethical views
concerning the life of a mystic. The normative tone in explicit comparisons of the
Ikhwan should not be underrated either, although their concentration is on the
process of knowledge. Taking into account the importance of knowledge in the
work and its obvious key position in their view of human perfection, 239 descrip¬
tions of the right kind of process in the achievement of knowledge are inevitably
loaded with ideals. In SuhrawardT’s allegorical story, the aim is evidently to de¬
scribe the ideal journey of the soul through the bodily kingdom, meaning the
earthly life of a human being as it should go.

The greatest difference between al-Ghazall and the other two is, however, the
almost complete absence of descriptions of the possible difficulties and failings in
the process of perfection in Suhrawardl’s and especially in Ikhwan’s comparisons.
Al-Ghazall’s ethical comparisons also describe the way the process can fail to
oppose the positive and negative faculties of the human being, while in
SuhrawardT’s journey the dangers and annoyances are mentioned but avoided. The
epistemological comparisons, on the other hand, seldom pay any attention to the
process of knowing of the ignorant and foolish, who simply reflect the process as
it is desired to proceed.

While structural microcosmism was the most obvious form of the analogy in
physiological explicit comparisons, in the spiritual ones the holistic tone is obvi¬
ous especially when the human being is compared with a city. Although they con¬
centrate on describing the human being, comparisons express the manmade order
of a city or royal troops as a replica of the one appearing in the human soul.

239

For more on this, see the next subsection.

168

5.3 THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE AND MICROCOSM

If the epistemological aspect is strongly present in the explicit spiritual compari¬
sons presented above, knowledge and theoretical ideas attached to it are connected
with microcosmism in many other ways as well. An interesting passage concern¬
ing this is the story of the wise king in the epistle On the Saying of the Wise that
the Human Being is a Microcosm, which brings together indications of many epis¬
temological ideas connected with the microcosm-macrocosm analogy in the
Rasa 'il. The Ikhwan illustrate their views continuously with metaphorical narra¬
tives in which they often employ Indian and Iranian literary traditions. This story
is dedicated to an explanation of the human being as al-Lawh al-Mahfuz, the
Well-preserved Tablet:

There was a wise and noble king, who had small children whom he loved and who
were dear to him. He wanted to teach and educate and drill them before attaching them
to his court, because only the sophisticated, educated, righteous and immaculate suit
the royal court. The king thought it wise and judicious to build them a castle ( qasr) in a
very solid way. He appointed to each of them a room (majlis) and wrote on the walls of
the rooms all the knowledge he wanted to teach his sons, describing all the things in
which he wanted them to be educated. Then he settled them to this castle, each to his
own part ( hissa ) and appointed to them servants, slave girls and slaves. He said to his
sons: “Consider what I have formed in front of you, read what I wrote for you and con¬
template what I explained to you. Think about these things so that you leam their
meanings and become good, excellent and pious, so that I may bring you to my court to
be among my boon companions, respected, happy and blessed with prosperity as long
as both I and you remain. (R II: 460)

Sciences that were painted on the walls are divided into six categories: astronomy
and geography form the first two groups. The third group consists of medicine and
natural sciences including sciences concerning animals, plants and minerals and
their uses. The fourth is handicrafts and trade, which includes human civilizations
and descriptions of cities. The fifth science is about religions, religious laws and
traditions. The sixth includes political sciences and knowledge concerning admin¬
istrative affairs. 240 At the end of the story, the Ikhwan explain the inner meaning
of the narrative:

The wise king is himself God, be he exalted. The small children are the humanity (al-
insdniyya) and the built castle is the whole sphere. The prepared rooms (majdlis) are
the human form {surat al-insari). The education ( al-ddab) described in it is the marvel¬
lous structure of the human body and the sciences written in it are the faculties and
knowledge (?na rifa) of the soul. (R II: 461)

In the Rasa ’il , there are various classifications of sciences, see de Callatay 2005b: 59-72 and
de Callatay 2008.

169

This story can be seen, on the one hand, as a description of the wonders of the
human being, both body and soul. At the moment of creation, all sciences, corre¬
sponding to the faculties and knowledge of an individual soul, were depicted in
the human form. In this way, the knowledge and abilities of an individual soul
correspond to the sciences in then entirety, and the abilities and knowledge of an
individual are manifold like the different branches of science concerning the
whole world. Like the Well-Preserved Tablet which includes knowledge concern¬
ing everything in the universe, the human form includes all faculties and
knowledge. The knowledge included in the human body is paralleled with outer,
adab -type knowledge, while the knowledge of the soul is described as the inner
gnosis ma rifa. In this form, the story of the wise king can be seen as a continua¬
tion of the short descriptions of the relation between the soul and the body (see
4.1.2) presented immediately before it in the same epistle.

If the microcosmic idea is taken more literally, which I would prefer, the story
of the wise king can be interpreted to be closely linked with certain major themes
in the epistemology of the Ikhwan. All of these themes are somehow connected
with the idea that the human being - his soul or his form - in his pure and perfect¬
ed state includes forms of everything and, thus, reflects reality as a whole. This
idea is closely related with the Platonic mirror metaphor, which has been explored
in the Rasd ’il by de Callatay (2005a). He considers the mirror metaphor to be in
many ways linked with the microcosmic themes of the work. According to de
Callatay, the metaphor occurs in its explicit and implicit forms in all four parts of
the work. As he points out, an explicit appearance of the mirror metaphor can be
found in the 43rd epistle, where the perfected human soul is described as a pol¬
ished and planar mirror, which in its luminosity reflects the realities of the forms
in the world, while an image in an unpolished and curved mirror is distorted (R
IV: 6). 241

In this subsection, I will examine the themes which appear in the story of the
wise king from three perspectives. First of all, it emphasizes self-knowledge in the
relationship between man and God: the education and sciences, which man is en¬
couraged to acquire, can be found by contemplating the human body and the hu¬
man soul. After considering them, a human being can enter the godly presence:
this also indicates the position of self-knowledge to be, if not knowledge leading
to salvation, at least knowledge related to it. The story also emphasizes the close
connection between self-knowledge and microcosmism. On the other hand, the
story of the wise king can be examined from the perspective of Platonic episte-

De Callatay (2005a: 190-192) remarks that al-Kindl introduces the mirror metaphor using
very similar vocabulary, and if he was not the source for the Ikhwan, the two may have a
common source, for instance the Theology of Aristotle, which contains similar passages as
well.

170

mology, which in Allers’s classification appears as psychological microcosmism.
The third theme related to the stoiy attaches it to the Sufi tradition of human per¬
fection.

5.3.1 Self-Knowledge

In the epistle On the Saying of the Wise that the Human Being is a Microcosm (R
II: 460), immediately before the story of the wise king, the Ikhwan describe the
human body as a library and man as a librarian. A human being forming a micro¬
cosm presents an image of man as a source of knowledge. Though the microcos-
mic idea in its epistemological forms approaches man mostly as a spiritual being,
in this context the physiological aspect of man is included, too: the human body as
a microcosm is thought to form an important source of knowledge of the sur¬
rounding material realm. 242 In the Rasd'il, self-knowledge often appears in the
context of microcosmism, and self-contemplation is recurrently related to man’s
position as the microcosm. 24 ’ I will firstly scrutinize the definition of self-
knowledge and the definition of “self’ in this context. After that, I examine the
goals of self-contemplation. Lastly, I suggest a way self-knowledge may be relat¬
ed to divine knowledge in the case of the Ikhwan.

5.3.1.1 Knowledge of the Self Knowledge of the Soul

The Ikhwan emphasize on several occasions that self-knowledge is the beginning
of all knowledge, a basis for all science (e.g., R II: 462). In the 32nd epistle (R III:
189), it is mentioned that it is “ugly of us to demand knowledge of the realities of
things without knowing ourselves”. In the epistle on the structure of the body (R
II: 378-379), the Ikhwan compare the one aspiring to other types of knowledge
without knowing himself with a famished person feeding others, a sick person
curing others, a naked person clothing others and a lost person showing the way to
others. Self-knowledge is obviously a necessary step to take before reaching for
other kinds of awareness, but what do the Ikhwan mean by this knowledge and by
the “self’ that is to be known?

Though Barkan does not give details of the epistemological microcosmic idea he refers to,
describing it as an intersection between the idea of man as the microcosm and that of the
human body as the microcosm (see 1.3.4), he might have had this kind of connection of
knowledge with corporeal microcosmism in mind.

Apart from the microcosmic epistles 26 and 34, self-knowledge also occurs in other contexts
together with microcosmism, e.g., in R II: 188-189 and IV: 169. In III: 34, the Ikhwan
describe self-knowledge as a key to the real sciences, because man is a combination of the
spiritual and material and, after that, they mention that they treat this theme more profoundly
in the epistle On the Saying of the Wise that the Human Being is a Microcosm.

171

The term self-knowledge ilm an-nafs is a rather problematic term in Arabic
on account of its ambivalent meaning. On the one hand, it can be translated as
.ve//-knowledgc or, on the other, knowledge of the soul. It is not possible to draw a
strict line between these two - contrarily, the same authors use the term to refer to
both of them. This is also the case in the Rasa il.

In the classification of sciences, which the structure of the work follows, “sci¬
ences of the soul and intellect” ( an-nafsdniyyat al- 'aqliyyat) form then own class
of knowledge between natural and theological sciences. At times the Ikhwan seem
to use 'ilm/ma 'rifat an-nafs synonymously with this branch of sciences. As an
illustration, in the fnst epistle (I: 79) the Ikhwan refer to “knowledge of the sub¬
stance of the soul” ( ilm jawhar an-nafs), describing this kind of knowledge as a
source for theological knowledge. Later in the same epistle (I: 101) they refer to
mathematical sciences as a door that leads to knowledge of the substance of the
soul. 244

More often, however, they seem to define 'ilm/ma 'rifat an-nafs as knowledge
of the self. This is obviously the case when they divide self-knowledge into three
levels (see, e.g., R II: 379). The first or the lowest level of self-knowledge is the
knowledge of oneself as a corporeal being. The second level of self-knowledge
concerns the soul and it is “the reflection of dominance of the soul over the parts
of the body and reflection of its faculties: which are they, how are they, and what
are their special characteristics” (R II: 379). Finally, the third and the highest level
of self-knowledge is the understanding of the whole that the two prior levels form
- the human being as a combination of the body and the soul. This includes “the
morality, activities, movements, skills, works, sounds and so on” (R II: 3 79). 245

The latter definition of self-knowledge is of interest for the definition of the
“self’. If self-knowledge also has as its object the human body, like the Ikhwan
seem to claim, the corporeal aspect would be included under the notion of the self,
which is usually defined to only consist of the spiritual in man. Regarding the
spiritual aspect of man, this definition of self-knowledge implies that the spiritual
in man is simply the sum of his faculties. In the context in which the Ikhwan (R II:
472) describe the cognitive faculties and their tasks they mention that:

Know, oh brother, that when the intelligent, the understanding one contemplates these
(cognitive) faculties preceding recollection, their qualities, emanation to the various
body-parts, their use in the perception of the sensible things, the way they produce im¬
ages of the objects of knowledge and how the soul lets them know about all of them in
all of its states, they are visible to him from soul to soul.

244

The term ilm an-nafs is evidently used in this sense also, e.g., in R II: 64.

245

In epistle 26 (R II: 462) it is first stated that "the gnosis of a human being of himself’
(ma rifat al-insan nafsahu ) is the beginning of all knowledge, and then this threefold
division is presented concerning gnosis. Hence, the Ikhwan also use this division without
connecting it specifically with self-knowledge, but with gnosis (ma ‘rifat in general.

172

Although the Ikhwan do not mention self-knowledge in this context, this and the
definition of the second level of self-knowledge above indicate the importance of
knowing the soul as a sum of its parts. When an important aspect of self-
knowledge is understood in this way, comparisons scrutinizing details attached to
the faculties of the soul are shown in the light of self-contemplation as instill¬
ments for that. This can also be deduced from the structure of the work: often, for
instance, in the epistle On the Structure of the Body ( R II: 378-379), before going
into the comparisons, the Ikhwan prime the reader with an admonition to know
himself.

In Kimlyd-yi sa 'ddat, al-Ghazall mentions contemplation of one’s own body
as a source of divine wisdom:

An important part of our knowledge of God arises from the study and contemplation of
our own bodies, which reveal to us the power of wisdom, and love of the Creator. His
power, in that from a mere drop - he has built up the wonderful frame of man; his
wisdom is revealed in its intricacies and the mutual adaptability of its parts and His
love is shown by His not only supplying such organs as are absolutely necessary for ex¬
istence, as the liver, the heart, and the brain, but those which are not absolutely neces¬
sary, as the hand, the foot, the tongue, and the eye. To these he has added, as orna¬
ments, the blackness of the hair, the redness of lips, and the curve of the eyebrows.

Man has been truly termed a “microcosm” or little world in himself and the structure of
his body should be studied not only by those who wish to become doctors, but by those
who wish to attain to a more intimate knowledge of God, just as close study of the ni¬
ceties and shades of language in a great poem reveals to us more and more of the geni¬
us of its author. (al-Ghazall (f): 9, trans. Field)

Thus, al-Ghazall would seem to define knowing one’s body as a form of self-
knowledge. In general, however, for al-Ghazall the “self’ is primarily a spiritual
concept. In the opening chapters of Ajd’ib al-qalh, al-Ghazall ((c): 695-697) un¬
ambiguously affirms that the “self’ is the heart, meaning the true essence of the
human being. This essence of humanity is subtle, divine and spiritual ( latTfa
rabbdniyya ruhdniyya) and its location in the material world is the physical heart.
As Kukkonen (2008: 216-217) points out, al-Ghazall defines as the first step of
self-knowledge the understanding of “the hosts of the heart”, meaning the sum of
the faculties of the human soul. These hosts comprise the lower part of the two¬
fold concept of the self for al-Ghazall. In addition to this lower, practical intellect,
which is the active part of the self, man has theoretical intellect, which forms the
passive, universal part of the self facing upwards. -47

This is a reference to the embryology presented in 4.3.1.1.
For more on the two-faced humanity of al-Ghazall, see 3.3.1.

173

5.3.1.2 The Goal of Self-Contemplation

As the microcosm, man can, by contemplating himself, obtain knowledge con¬
cerning the world around him and understand its structure and functions. This
appears in the 26th epistle:

When the Creator, his exaltedness be exalted, wanted to inform the human soul of the
treasures of his sciences and to show it the world in its entirety, he knew that the world
is wide and big and that it would be impossible for a man to travel everywhere in order
to see everything; human life is so short in comparison with the age of the universe. He
thought it wise to create a microcosm, in which the whole macrocosm is summarized.

He shaped in the microcosm everything that is in the macrocosm, placed it in front of
him and showed it to him. (R II: 462)

The Ikhwan find the correspondences natural and do not present any explicit rea¬
son for the parallelism between man and the universe. As de Callatay (2005a:
197) points out, this passage seems, however, to imply an explanation for the
analogy: man was created as the microcosm, because God wanted to make all
knowledge available for him.

Later in the same epistle, the Ikhwan list some aspects of reality, which are
revealed through microcosmic man:

248

The wise have said that the human being is a unity after all plurality, like the Crea¬
tor, his praise be exalted, is unity before all plurality. He is called a microcosm because
of all that we have mentioned: the marvels of the structure of the human body, the
wonders of the uses of his soul and all the arts, sciences, morals, opinions, ways, doc¬
trines, actions, works, sayings and other corporeal and spiritual effects that he shows in
his whole construction. (R II: 475)

As we can see, the microcosmic man includes every created thing, which makes
him a source of knowledge concerning both the spiritual and the corporeal created
world. Thus, the Ikhwan seem to connect the knowledge achieved through self¬
contemplation primarily with the created world. This is also supported by their
threefold division of self-knowledge presented above, according to which know¬
ing oneself includes both the body and the soul: a man who reaches true self-
knowledge knows himself as a combination of the corporeal and the spiritual.

Exclusion of the divine presence from the sphere of self-knowledge can also
be seen in the explicit comparisons. Despite a few exceptions, one of them pre¬
senting the Imam in the role of the intellect and another presenting God as the
rational soul (cited in 5.1.2.2), the Ikhwan almost always restrict their compari¬
sons to the sphere of the created. Al-Ghazall (e.g., (c): 702) and Ibn ‘ArabI (e.g.,
211), however, quite often include such divine elements as the Throne ( al-'arsh )
and the Footstool (al-kursi) in then explicit comparisons.

248

I read wahdatun rather than wahdahu as in Butrus al-Bustam’s edition.

174

Self-knowledge is, however, attached to the knowledge of God in the Delphic
Maxim, which recurs in the Rasa 'il. It appears, for instance, in the form: “who
knows himself, knows God” (see, e.g., R I: 76, III: 375 and IV: 193). This maxim,
which in the Islamic tradition is known as a hadlth, was, as Daniel De Smet
(2010: 78) indicates, thought in the early sources to be connected to the Sabians of
Harran. 249 It is not exceptional in the Islamic tradition to link the Delphic maxim
with microcosmism and, in this way, emphasize that the final goal of self¬
contemplation is knowledge of God (see Takeshita 1987: 86-91 and Altmann
1969: 1-40). In the Rasd'il, however, microcosmism and the Delphic Maxim do
not appear connected to each other.

Altmann (1969: 8-11) mentions al-Ghazall among those explicitly linking
self-contemplation with the microcosmic idea and divine knowledge. This can be
seen in the passage from the Kimlya-yi sa 'ddat cited above. In it, the goal of ex¬
amining one’s own body is attached to divine knowledge. In the Mishkdt, al-
Ghazall ((b): 31) explains that Adam was created in the form of the All-Merciful
and given the form which brings together everything in the cosmos; this form is
“divine handwriting, which is not written with letters”. After that it is mentioned
that “if it were not for this mercy, the human beings would not be capable of
knowing their Lord, since one knows one’s Lord only by knowing oneself’ (trans.
Buchman).

In the TadbTrdt (Ibn ‘Arab!: 209-210), the author explicitly links self-
knowledge with knowledge of the attributes of God. After citing the Delphic
Maxim it is said that the same attributes appear in both God and man. Ibn ‘Arab!
adds, however, that the secret of these attributes, which reveal the real essence of
God, cannot be achieved through knowing the attributes only. He clarifies that the
layers of reality, higher and lower, can be found in the human being and that 98
out of the 99 attributes of God can also be found elsewhere in the world, while the
99th can only be found in the human being.

5.3.1.3 The Self as a Mirror of the Divine

As we saw in the story of the wise king, the Ikhwan seem, however, to assume
that God created the correspondence between man and the universe for education¬
al purposes concerning not only the sphere of the earthly. In this way, the story
connects self-knowledge with salvation. Hence, an essential question in the case
of the Rasd’il is that if the knowledge acquired through self-contemplation refers
to earthly knowledge only, what is its relationship with salvation and knowledge
concerning the divine?

In al-Mas'udi’s Muruj adh-dhahab, the maxim appears in the form “man 'arafa dhatahu
ta allaha” (De Smet 2010: 78).

175

An answer to this may be deduction of the higher type of knowledge from the
lower. In general, according to the Ikhwan, knowledge of things is at least partly
achieved through analogies: in the second epistle (I: 100) they refer to analogies
(i amthal ) at the earthly level that are used by the wise to refer to things at the high¬
er levels. These contexts do not explicitly refer to the human being as the other
counterpart of the analogy. In the context of theological sciences, however, the
analogy is explained to appear between the human being and the universe: the
Ikhwan claim to have found one basis and analogy that summarizes the whole of
reality and contains all knowledge, namely the human form.

One who claims to master the real sciences and claims to be able to answer well the
questions we posed above has to be asked to answer these questions with one basis and
one analogy. He can only do this if he takes as a basis the human form, from all forms
- spheres, celestial bodies, elements, animals, plants, et cetera. Whichever he may
choose from the other forms, he would never be able to find in it the analogy of every
existing thing. He can only find all the answers in the same way that we have used as
analogies and which we have employed. (R IV: 12)

This citation indicates the way in which one can attain real knowledge of the es¬
sences of things by means of the human form. As de Callatay (2005a: 195) points
out, it is noteworthy that in this passage the analogy is specifically about the hu¬
man form - not the human soul alone. Like in the story of the wise king, the hu¬
man being is like the Well-Preserved Tablet, al-Lawh al-Mahfuz, on which all the
sciences and wisdom have been drawn, and it therefore includes all knowledge.

The general idea of one kind of knowledge being deducible from another kind
of knowledge is present in the Rasa 'il in many ways. The authors refer to the
Hermetic idea that “the lower is a sign of the higher” (e.g., R II: 380) and it occurs
at times in the context of microcosmism as well. The primary emphasis of this
maxim is on the ontological connection between different levels of reality, but it
can be interpreted as an epistemological argument as well.

The relationship between different levels of knowledge is more explicitly pre¬
sent when the concepts of the manifest ( zahir ) and the concealed ( bdtin ) are in¬
volved. These concepts prevail in all IsmaTlI thought and Sufism and appear in
the Rasa ’il as well. 250 As two aspects of religion they also occur connected with a
form of elementaristic microcosmism and in the 42nd epistle (R III: 486), where it
is said that because the human being is a combination of the material and the spir ¬
itual, the rulings of the religions and divine ordinances have two aspects: manifest
and concealed. This division appears at the level of knowledge as well. According
to the Ikhwan, “God made all material and sensible things parallels and signs of
the spiritual and intelligible things. He made the way of the senses ladders and

According to Netton (1979: 53-62), it should be noted, however, that these concepts differ in
the thought of the Ikhwan from their Isma'IlT counterparts in some aspects.

176

stairs to ascend to the knowledge of the intelligibles, which is the highest goal for
a soul to attain.” (R III: 246) In this way, knowledge of the material world can
lead to knowledge of the real essences of things and spiritual knowledge can be
derived from knowledge concerning the material world. Thus, when it comes to
self-knowledge as defined by the Ikhwan, it might be said that we are talking
about divine knowledge, but only indirectly.

This is also supported by definitions of science in the Rasa ’il. Real knowledge
can be attained, according to the Ikhwan, through philosophy and logic as well as
through religious sciences. 251 The importance of scientific knowledge and ration¬
ality is evident and can be perceived from the manner the Ikhwan arrange their
work in the form of a scientific encyclopedia. In spite of this, the Ikhwan find no
contradiction between revelation and rationality. 252 According to the Rasa 'il (R III
28: 30), they share the same divine source and both aspire to the same goal, the
purification of the soul. In the Rasa 'il, the scientific disciplines have been orga¬
nized into a strict hierarchy according to which they should be studied. The lower
discipline is said to be a reflection of the one above it (see, e.g., R I: 70). 25j In this
way, the hierarchically higher discipline always represents the real essences of
things more clearly than the ones below it, though both are images of the same
reality. This is explained concretely in the case of mathematics and its research
objects. In their first epistle, in which the Ikhwan describe the qualities of num¬
bers and their cosmological positions, they remark that one should start from ilm
al- ‘adad rather than other mathematical sciences. This is because such knowledge
is concealed in each soul potentially, and in the soul are the analogies ( amthdl ) to
all the sciences (R I: 75). 254 This passage may also imply that numbers are consid-

Discussion concerning the relationship between reason and revelation has often, especially in
Western research, been regarded as a highly essential theme in mediaeval Islamic
philosophy. Although its importance is exaggerated, such a discussion naturally formed part
of the philosophical discourse and the best-known examples of it are al-Ghazall with his
Tahafut al-falasifa and Ibn Rushd’s works Tahafut at-tahafut and Fasl al-maqal. As is
generally acknowledged, Ibn Rushd does not see any contradiction between revelation and
reason, but envisages the two as different ways to approach the truth (see, e.g., Taylor 2005:
184-185).

Baffioni (2000b) has examined the relationship between scientific knowledge and revelation
in the Rasa ’il and shows that the concepts of science and religion are closely linked by the
Ikhwan. Although there are passages which may imply contradiction between science and
faith, in other passages the authors are quite clear that scientists and philosophers are placed
at the same level as prophets.

Though similar to it, the Ikhwan’s way of arranging scientific disciplines differs from the
Aristotelian division. While for the Ikhwan mathematics is placed before physics, for
Aristotle the mathematical sciences are a step closer to the theological sciences. As de
Callatay (2005b: 66) states, this may be due to the Pythagorean influence in the Rasa ’il.

In the epistle on magic (R IV: 396) it is explained that ilm al-'adad is like the Universal
Intellect having forms of every intellectual being within it. Later in the same epistle (R IV:

177

ered in the Pythagorean way to be similar to Platonic ideas and, as such, form a
separate level ofbeing.

If the previously presented view of the human being as an analogy is exam¬
ined in the context of the sciences forming various layers corresponding to each
other, the human being - and, for this reason, self-knowledge as a source of
knowledge - could be seen as a layer of this system. Hence, even if the Ikhwan do
not present their view as clearly as, for instance, Ibn ‘Arab!, contemplating one¬
self might in this way be a source in the acquisition of knowledge ultimately lead¬
ing to its highest, divine form. This might be an explanation for the contradictory
way the Ikhwan present the goal of self-knowledge being, on the one hand, strict¬
ly earthly and, on the other, connected with the divine gnosis.

5.3.2 Knowing as Actualizing a Microcosm

Another possible interpretation of the story of the wise king is to take it as an ex¬
pression of the epistemology of the authors. Microcosmism is relevant in various
epistemological systems. It can be approached in the mediaeval theories of
knowledge from two perspectives. Firstly, and most commonly, it appears as a
result of intellectual perfection since a human being, who has achieved all
knowledge, often forms a microcosm at the mental level. Secondly, in some, es¬
pecially Platonic theories of knowledge, the mental microcosm in potential form
is seen as a requirement for acquiring knowledge. 255

5.3.2.1 Knowledge Making a Microcosm

Sari Nuseibeh (1996: 835-837) divides the epistemological systems of Islamic
philosophers into two groups: one closer to theological epistemology and the oth¬
er following the Neoplatonic theory of knowledge. He mentions Ibn SIna (d.
1037) as a representative of the theological side. Nuseibeh characterizes the pro¬
cess of acquiring knowledge in theological epistemology as more subjective than
in the Neoplatonic one. In Ibn SIna’s system, the forms of the perceived objects
drawn in the human mind are strongly dependent on the individual intuition and,
for this reason, differ from the forms existing in the Active Intellect. As an exam¬
ple of Neoplatonic epistemology, Nuseibeh mentions al-Farabi. As is characteris-

410) it is described as the king among all sciences and astronomy is said to be like its
minister.

The change in the emanationistic cosmology which took place in IsmaTlism between the
Ikhwan as-Safa’ and al-Kirmanl, namely the addition of ten intellects between the Active
Intellect and the human intellect, modified microcosmism from the perspective of
epistemology. This change in the cosmological system and the way microcosmism was seen
as part of the epistemological system after that are interesting topics in the later IsmaTli
elaborations of microcosmism, but will not be examined here.

178

tic for Neoplatonism, in al-Farabl’s system ontology and epistemology are bound
together. The forms that man receives into his particular intellect in the process of
acquiring knowledge are the real essences of things and are parallel to those in the
Active Intellect. Thus, an intellectually perfect man is a reflection of the Active
Intellect and includes the real essences of the objects of knowledge.

Although microcosmism is seldom explicitly mentioned in these contexts, in
both epistemological systems the particular intellect that has reached its perfection
can be seen as the microcosm reflecting the whole universe. In the latter, the mi¬
crocosm formed by the individual human mind reflects the Active Intellect objec¬
tively, while the theological epistemology adds a subjective level to it. In Allers’s
(1944: 330-331) classification this kind of microcosmism pertains to the psycho¬
logical microcosm-macrocosm analogy. Brague (1997: 533) seems to refer to this
interpretation as well when he characterizes the forms of the microcosmic idea
appearing in the Arabic tradition but left out of his examination: “L’imitation du
monde est transposee pour ne plus porter sur le monde sensible, mais sur le
monde des idees. II faudra «devenir le monde intelligible»” In this context, he
mentions that some Muslim philosophers develop it and refers to Miskawayh (d.
1030) and to the al-Ildhiydt of Ibn Sina’s ash-Shtfa' (IX: 7, 11) in which Ibn SIna
notes that:

(In the case of) the rational soul, the perfection proper to it consists in its becoming an
intellectual world in which there is impressed the form of the whole; the order in the
whole that is intellectually apprehended; and the good that emanates on the whole, be¬
ginning with the Principle of the whole (and) proceeding then to the noble, spiritual,
absolute substances, then to the spiritual substances - (substances) that in some manner
are connected to bodies - then to the exalted bodies with their configurations and pow¬
ers, and so on until it completes within itself (the realization of) the structure of exist¬
ence in its entirety. (Ibn SIna: 350, trans. Marmura)

Allers includes in psychological microcosmism theories closer to the Aristotelian
model as well as the Platonic ones. He, however, accentuates the importance of
the interpretation concerning universals in this context: Platonic realism, where
the acquisition of knowledge is seen as the formation of real essences of things in
the human mind, forms the most fertile ground for the psychological microcosm-
macrocosm analogy. For this reason, the psychological analogy has been elaborat¬
ed mostly by philosophers influenced by Platonism and especially Neoplatonism.

The epistemological system of the Ikhwan quite evidently stands as a repre¬
sentative of the same branch as al-Farabfs in Nuseibeh’s twofold division. In the
Rasa il, there are some explicit references to the microcosmic position of the ac¬
tualized human soul. As Baffioni (2000: 430) remarks, “[i]n the encyclopaedia,
science (or sciences) are usually defined (with slight differences from case to
case) as siirat al-ma ‘him fi nafs al- ‘alim (“the form of the intelligible in the know-
er’s soul”).” It seems clear that for the Ikhwan knowledge of everything would

179

mean having the forms of all things known in the human soul, or in the intellect,
which the soul as a result of this process turns to: “It (the intellect) is only the hu¬
man soul, once it became actually learned after it was potentially learned. And it
became actually learned after the essences of things had been deduced within it by
means of the senses, and the forms of their quiddities by means of cogitation and
consideration.” ( B : 158, trans. Baffkmi, ini?: 138) 256

53.2.2 Potential Microcosm as a Requirement for Knowledge

It is characteristic especially of the Platonic branch of epistemological systems
that without a potential microcosm in the human being - in his soul, intellect or
heart - achieving knowledge would not be possible. This appears in the Platonic
theory of anamnesis as a requirement of the potential forms or ideas of all objects
of knowledge drawn in the human mind, before them being actualized as a result
of processing knowledge.

If the story of the wise king is examined from the epistemological perspective,
it could be related to the Platonic theory of anamnesis: God drew all knowledge
into the human form in creation and, hence, the acquisition of knowledge is about
the actualization of the objects of knowledge already present in the human soul.
According to Baffioni (2008a: 104 n. 8), however, there is only one explicit refer¬
ence to Platonic anamnesis in the Rasa 'il (III: 424) and it is seldom referred to in
Islamic sources in general. Netton (1982: 17) emphasizes that the actualization of
the potential knowledge concealed in the human soul differs in the Ikhwan’s
thought from Platonic epistemology in that, in the Rasd'il, there is no assumption
of remembering something that would have been in the human mind before birth.

In the epistle on sensory knowledge (R II: 416), the Ikhwan urge the reader to
contemplate the reality around him, because all knowledge is potentially integrat¬
ed into the human soul. They say that by examining the essences of things it is
possible to actualize the human intellect. This is explicitly stated in the epistle On
the Saying of the Wise that the Human Being is a Microcosm-.

The virtues of the soul are completed only when it learns its essence ( dhataha ) and the
reality of its substance. The virtues of its substance become clear to it only when it
learns the states of its own world, which is the human form. This is because the Crea¬
tor, be he praised, created the human being in the fairest stature (Q. 95:4) and shaped

The Ikhwan also explain the uselessness of the soul without the intellect comparing the need
of the intellect for the soul with that of light for sight (R II: 416). The potentiality and
actuality of souls is used in the 29th epistle (R III: 47) in an interesting way to explain the
hierarchy between learned: the actualized souls of religious scholars ('ulama ’) are said to be
the potential souls of philosophers, while the actualized souls of philosophers, on the other
hand, are the potential souls of the wise (hukama ’) and the best of the wise are potential
angels for their souls.

180

him in the most perfect form. He made the human form the mirror of his soul, in order
show in it the picture of the macrocosm. (R II: 462)

This passage may also be understood advising to self-contemplation. Thus, the
epistemological idea of the potential microcosm in the human mind enabling the
achievement of knowledge partly overlaps with the topic of the human being as a
source of knowledge.

The Rasa il is ambiguous about whether the potential microcosm at the level
of the human soul concerns man as an individual or humankind collectively.
There is a possibility that the Ikhwan refer in this context to the human archetype
(see 3.2.1), whose form is the model for all human souls after him. Hence, it
would not be an individual man whose intellect potentially reflects the whole uni¬
verse, but man at the cosmic level. The human archetype, also known as Adam,
knows everything in the universe, because, as mentioned in the Qur’an: God
“taught Adam the names, all of them” (Q. 2:31). Human beings collectively corre¬
spond to this archetype and therefore together they can know everything in the
universe.

There are some passages in the Rasa'il which quite explicitly support this
view. It is argued a few times that one soul would never have the capacity for all
the sciences (' ulum ), but they have to be pursued by all people together (e.g., R
III: 404). In the 42nd epistle (R III: 426-427), in a chapter which describes the
Intellect, but also the difference between individual and universal beings, it is
said:

The human form is a summarization ( mukhtasara ) of all the animal forms and the hu¬
man being brings in him together all the faculties of plants, the characteristics of min¬
erals, the natures of the elements and the beings of the World of Generation and Cor¬
ruption. All of these cannot be brought together in one individual, but they are divided
into all individuals of this form. - '

One of the reasons for the differences between individual men is the different
number of these things which appear in different individuals. The whole variety of
activities, works and arts cannot be pursued by an individual human being. In the

Concerning the last sentence of the quotation, see note 129.

The same view occurs in the Rasa’il in other forms as well. For example, in the 32nd epistle
(R III: 244), the Ikhwan bring the topic up by saying that “one corporeal notebook" cannot
contain all sciences. In the subsection The Need of the Human Being to Collaborate in the
epistle on geometrical sciences (I: 99-100), this is formulated in the following way: “One
human being alone cannot but live an unhappy life, because for the good life he needs to
master various arts, and one man cannot achieve all of them, because his life is short and the
arts are many." This can be linked with the Hippocratic Maxim “ars longa, vita brevis”,
which has been used by Islamic philosophers especially in the discussion about different
scientific disciplines and their methods. For instance, Ibn Rushd employs statements of this
kind which defend the use of syllogism in Fasl al-maqal.

181

same context, “the form of the human forms” is said to govern all individuals and
to be the Caliph of God on earth. The universal absolute man or the universal ra¬
tional human soul is not explicitly mentioned, but all the elements of microcos-
mism which also appear in the description of the human archetype in the ninth
epistle are listed. The 42nd epistle, however, concentrates on knowledge, which
indicates that the Ikhwan may well aim to express that the position of the micro¬
cosm in this form does not pertain to an individual man but to the universal hu¬
man archetype.

The requirement for the potential mental microcosm appears explicitly in
Ajd 'ib al-qalb ((c): 711-712), where al-Ghazall explains the process of acquiring
knowledge and places on it two conditions. Firstly, “you can never apprehend
anything save that which has reached you”, meaning that perceived things have to
reach the intellectual level of existence in order to be known. This intellectual
level is the fourth in al-Ghazall’s four degrees ( darajdt ) of existence. The first is
the al-Lawh al-Mahfuz, which is prior to all corporeal existence. After that fol¬
lows the real (haqiqi) existence of the entities in the corporeal world. When things
are perceived by a human being they become existent at the third, imaginative
level, after which they reach the fourth level, intellectual existence in the heart. In
this way, the perfected human heart becomes a reflection of al-Lawh al-Mahfuz.
Acquiring knowledge is possible only - and this is the second condition given to
the achievement of knowledge - if the images of objects of knowledge already
exist in the essence ( dhdt ) of the human being: “and were it not that he has placed
an image ( mithal ) of the whole world within your very being ( dhdtika ) you would
have no knowledge of that which is apart from yourself’ (trans. Skellie, in al-
Ghazall (d): 59). The way to explain this in the context of the four degrees of ex¬
istence connects the question of acquiring knowledge with a more extensive onto¬
logical system of correspondences between different layers of reality and the idea
that “the lower is a sign of the higher” (see above 5.3.1.3), which is closely con¬
nected with the psychological microcosm-macrocosm analogy.

Whether or not the story of the wise king is interpreted as an expression of
any kind of theory of knowledge, it seems to claim two things: on the one hand, it
connects the earthly knowledge and sciences to the divine knowledge of God, and,
on the other hand, brings knowledge to the centre of human perfection. The prom¬
inence of knowledge in the spiritual development of a human individual is empha¬
sized in the whole Rasd'il, and is also explicitly claimed in the 28th epistle (R III:
30), which lists four conditions for the purification of the soul: the first is
knowledge of the real essences of things and the other three sincere thoughts, true
moral and virtuous character, and good deeds. Concerning the type of knowledge
referred to in this context, it seems quite clear that the Ikhwan see all sciences as
necessary steps in the path of perfection. This is expounded in the 35th epistle (R

182

Ill: 246-247), in which knowledge leading to salvation is described as spiritual
knowledge, belonging to man for his soul, but the sensory knowledge, which is
due to his corporeal aspect, is also mentioned as an absolute prerequisite for salva-

5.3.3 Microcosm and Mystical Perfection

The microcosmic idea is also relevant in some Sufi views on human perfection. In
this subsection, I will take a brief look at two separate microcosmic themes in
mystical philosophy and examine some similarities between these and the atti¬
tudes of the Ikhwan towards perfection as they express them in the story of the
wise king.

5.3.3.1 Spiritual Castle(s) in the Human Soul

Paralleling the human soul, the human being or the human heart with a house,
pavilion, fortress - or castle - is usual in microcosmic contexts. As has been seen,
such references appear in addition to the Ikhwan, in al-QazwInl’s, SuhrawardT’s,
Ibn ‘ Arabl’s and also in al-Ghazall’s works on various occasions. The idea of sev¬
en spiritual castles or seven rooms of a castle concealed in the human soul forms,
however, its own tradition of microcosmism. It is popular in mediaeval Sufi litera¬
ture, and in the previous research it has been found to be quite universal in mysti¬
cism in general. According to Luce Lopez-Baralt (1992: 107-126), it can be
traced back to early Babylonian as well as Persian traditions. A corresponding
metaphor is also employed in Jewish Hekhalot- writings, written during the fifth
and sixth centuries. In the Islamic tradition, Lopez-Baralt mentions Abu al-
Husayn an-Nurl (d. 907), Abu Hamid al-Ghazall and Najm ad-DIn al-Kubra (d.
1220) as examples of the elaborators of the analogy.

For Sufis, the castles or rooms of the castle stand for the stations ( maqdmat )
on the way to the spiritual perfection. The mystic proceeds by passing through six
of them and reaches the seventh castle, or the innermost part of the castle, in
which he finds the Godly Presence. As a specific feature of the Sufi version of the
spiritual castle metaphor, Lopez-Baralt remarks that the stations are reached in a
specific order and one is completed before passing to the next one. The castles or
rooms of the castle are concealed in one’s own soul and, in this way, in the allego¬
ry the human soul can be considered a miniature of its perfection, a microcosm. 260

In the context of individual sciences the Ikhwan also claim that their final goal is spiritual,
see, e.g., R I: 103-104, in which the goal of mathematical sciences is said to be “the
awakening from the dream of negligence”.

In his translation of Hayakil an-nur (SuhrawardI (f): 107-121), al-Halveti has added an
epilogue attributed to Shaykh Muhammad Sadiq Naqshbandi Erzinjani which is of interest

183

Similarly to the Sufi versions of the castle analogy, in the story of the Ikhwan
the sciences have been divided into six groups, which the wise king paints on the
walls of the castle. As was seen above, in the Rasd’il scientific knowledge is
placed in an essential role in human perfection and scientific disciplines can even
be paralleled with the stations in Sufi thought: like the Sufi stations, study of dif¬
ferent scientific disciplines is seen as a well-organized process which proceeds
from concrete to abstract disciplines. Similarly to the stations reached by a Sufi in
his process of perfection, each of the sciences is studied and perfected in system¬
atic order. As the Sufis reach the six stations before achieving the vicinity of the
Lord, the human beings in the story of the Ikhwan perfect their knowledge in the
sciences before entering the court of God. Both Sufis and the Ikhwan find a min¬
iature for perfection in the human being and describe the soul as a castle. This is
not to say that these two metaphors were necessarily related to each other, but
since the Ikhwan use some expressions familiar to Sufis and are known to have
influenced later Sufism as well, this approach to the story may open up new view¬
points on it. 261

53.3.2 Actualization of the Microcosm as Polishing One’s Heart

If for the Ikhwan the knowledge concealed in the human being includes all the
sciences, and the actualization of the spiritual microcosm is about mastering the
scientific disciplines drawn in the human soul in creation, for al-Ghazall and
many other Sufis, the actualization process is about polishing one’s heart, which
then turns into a reflection of the attributes of God.

In the 24th epistle of the Rasd’il, in which the Ikhwan ( R II: 415-416) attach
the middle position of man to knowledge, explaining that just as the human being

from the perspective of this kind of microcosmism. In it, the states of the development of a
soul are explained with the story of a wanderer who travels from one city to another. The
first is the city of darkness called ammara and, in the middle of it, there is another walled
city, which is called lawwama. Again, at the centre of this city, there is a city called
mulhama, and after it another called mutma inna. Each time after completing the virtues
pertaining to the city, the wanderer may enter the next. In this last city, there is the district of
annihilation ( fana ’) and after losing his personal attributes, the wanderer hears the word
"return”. These stations in the development of the soul are similar to the stages of the soul
described by SuhrawardI previously in this same work ( see note 216) and also in accordance
with Qur anic terminology.

Similarities between the religious thought of the Ikhwan and the Sufi concept of stations
have been recognized in earlier research. Khoury-Samani (1993-1994) compares the six
degrees of the faithful presented in the 46th epistle with the stations as they are introduced by
the tenth-century Sufi al-Kalabadhl. The Ikhwan say that the path of the purification of the
soul has six stages: confidence ( tawakkul ), sincerity ( ikhlas ), patience ( sabr ), contentment
(rida’), fear (khawf) and abstinence (zuhd). As Khoury-Samani points out (1993-1994: 14-
16), these six stations appear among al-Kalabadhl’s seventeen stations and are described in a
similar manner.

184

is a combination of the spiritual and material, so the soul is cosmologically the
middle being below the spiritual beings and above the merely material ones. The
soul perceives the things above it by the senses and the things below it by the in¬
tellect. As stated above, for al-Ghazall this middle position is an essential aspect
of anthropology: the human being, more specifically the human heart, has two
doors or aspects, one of them towards the material world and the other towards
the spiritual world ((c): 712). In al-Ghazall’s case as well, this also applies to his
epistemology: the former makes it possible for a man to achieve knowledge
through the senses, the latter gives him an ability to see al-Lawh al-Mahfuz and, in
this way, perceive the spiritual. The knowledge of the spiritual is the divine
knowledge of the prophets and saints, while the sensory knowledge is that of the
learned and philosophers. The difference between these two types of knowledge is
explained with a story:

The story is told that once the Chinese and the Byzantines vied with one another before
a certain King as to the beauty of their workmanship in decorating and painting. So the
King decided to give over to them a portico so that the Chinese might decorate one side
of it and the Byzantines the other side. [...] The Byzantines gathered together countless
strange colours, but the Chinese entered without any colour at all and began to polish
their side and to brighten it. [...] On the side of the Chinese there shone forth the won¬
ders of the Byzantine skill with added illumination and dazzling brilliance, since that
side had become like unto a polished mirror by reason of much brightening. Thus the
beauty of their side was increased by its added clearness. The care of the saints in
cleansing, polishing, purifying, and clarifying the heart until the true nature of the Real
shines forth clearly therein with utmost illumination is like the work of the Chinese.

The care of the learned and philosophers in acquiring and adorning knowledge, and
representation of this adornment in the heart, is like the work of the Byzantines, (al-
Ghazall (c): 712-713, trans. Skellie, in al-Ghazall (d): 61—63)

In this story we can see that all divine knowledge can be found potentially in
one’s heart, which in its actualized state reflects the whole al-Lawh al-Mahfuz, in
this way forming a microcosm. If in the case of the Ikhwan this actualization pro¬
cess also requires knowledge acquired through the senses (at least as the first
stage of self-knowledge), in al-Ghazall’s story sensible knowledge is clearly an¬
other and completely distinct category of knowledge." 62

Ibn ‘Arab! develops psychological microcosmism extensively in his thought
and the concept is closely related to the perfection of a human being. In his
thought, like in Sufi thought in general, the analogy has the third level: God. Ac¬
cording to Ibn 'Arab!, God created the world in order to make himself known. The
whole created universe is a reflection of his attributes. These attributes are sum¬
marized in the most noble thing among the created, the perfect man. Hence, a man

The Platonic mirror metaphor is very explicitly present especially in this passage from al-
Ghazall.

185

who perfects himself - not solely but primarily by means of knowledge - be¬
comes a microcosm and a reflection of the attributes of God. (Chittick 1989: 17)

This is explained in the first chapter of the TadbTrdt and is also attached to the
human being as al-Lawh al-Mahfuz (Ibn 'Arab!: 124-126). It is first explained
that God taught Adam all his attributes and the relationship of the soul to the mi¬
crocosm is like the relationship of Adam to the macrocosm. Later it is noted that
the human soul is “a summary of the secrets of the world ( majmu ' asrdr al-
'alam), a copy ( nuskha ) of it on a small scale and a plan for everything in order
for the human being to benefit from this” (125). After that it is explained that the
human being is the most perfect among beings and “it is in the prominence of this
being that in its purest and most exalted form in the human being can be seen the
Truth in its essence and its immaterial attributes, not those of the human being
himself.” (125) For this, the all-encompassing human being is al-Lawh al-Mahfuz,
and the perfect man works as the guide (imam) in the search of truth.

Since divine attributes can be found in the human being, it is quite natural that
the divine levels of reality are also present in explicit comparisons. Ibn ‘ArabI
(211) compares the human body with the Throne, the soul with the Footstool, the
heart with the original Ka‘ba and the human spirit with the angelic world. 21 ’’Alt¬
hough such comparisons at the level of the human being do not occur in the
Rasd’il , in the 16th epistle (R II: 26), describing the absolute body, the Ikhwan
refer to the sphere of the fixed stars as the Footstool and to the outmost sphere, al-
Muhlt, as the Throne.

In the light of these examples, it can be seen that in Sufi elaborations of mi-
crocosmism God is added as his own level in the analogies. In this way, the hu¬
man being is seen as the transmitting level between the divine and the mun-
dane. 264 Although this third level is mostly absent in the Rasa 'il, when it comes to

Similar comparisons can be found in Aja ’ib al-qalb, see, e.g., al-Ghazali (c): 702.

The universe as the transmitting level between man and God has usually been attached to the
microcosm-macrocosm analogy in Eastern traditions. For example, as Marquet (1966: 64-
69) notes, in the cosmology of Harranians, the universe is in the middle position between
man and God. The celestial bodies are reflections of God. Thus, God is materially present in
the universe in the form of his incarnation, the celestial bodies. Each of the celestial bodies
also has its correspondence in the parts of the human body. In this way, in Harranian thought,
the celestial bodies form a transmitting level and there is an indirect correspondence between
man and God. Marquet finds parallel speculation in the Ikhwan’s ontological system, only
placed at the different level of the hierarchy of beings. In the Rasa 'il, the souls of the
celestial bodies are angels emanating from the Universal Soul and the faculties of the
Universal Soul. According to the Ikhwan’s well-defined hierarchy of souls, all the souls of
the lower, material world are reflections from the angelic souls. Because man is the
microcosm, all souls of the material world are integrated into the human soul. In this way,
the human soul indirectly corresponds to the Universal Soul. In Harranian thought, the
celestial spheres as corporeal beings are considered the intennediate level between man and

186

the microcosmic position of man, there are, as was seen, some similarities be¬
tween the Ikhwan and these Sufi thinkers as regards human perfection.

5.4 MICROCOSMIC ARTS

The third level also appears in the analogies when the activities of man or the hu¬
man artefacts are seen as microcosms. This kind of microcosmism can be found in
the Jabirian Corpus as well as in the Rasa’il. The topic will first be examined
through the idea of man imitating the Creator in his acts. Secondly, the influence
of this kind of microcosmism in the overall definition of an artistic discipline will
be examined through the Ikhwan’s theory of music.

5.4.1 Imitating the Creator

Often in their description of the human soul, the Ikhwan refer to the correspond¬
ing features between the Universal Soul and the human soul:

He who wants to know how the forms existed in the Universal Soul before they were
emanated into matter, must consider the state of the forms of human artefacts, how they
exist in men’s souls before men manifest them in the materials that are the object of
their arts, as we have explained in the epistle on arts. (B: 27, trans. Baffioni, in B: 76)

In addition to emphasizing the similarity between man and the universe as a
whole, this passage compares the cosmological process of creation, which takes
place through the Universal Soul, to the creation executed by an individual man.
The human being is presented as a “creator on a small scale”. 265

It is, however, not only the act of a human being which is seen as analogical
to the act of God, but also the products of these acts. The skilled artist produces
art, which imitates the ideals appearing at the macrocosmic level. A piece of art
imitates the creation as a whole, for instance, in its proportions. 266 In the Rasa 'il,
this is summarized in the epistle on music:

According to the same analogy and model that skilled artists produce their artefacts,
whether shaped, scalped, or painted, so as to be proportionate to one another in con¬
struction, composition and arrangement, in all these respects emulating the work of the
Creator, exalted be his name, and imitating his wisdom, just as it has been stated defin-

God, while in the Rasa ’il the spheres are treated as a spiritual intermediate level between
man and the Universal Soul.

It is to be noted, however, that elsewhere in the Rasa 'il the Ikhwan express the theological
view that God’s relation to the created world should not be compared to that of the builder of
a house to the house or to that of the writer to the book, but to that of the speaker to speech:
if he falls silent, the speech ceases to exist (R III: 337).

As was seen in 4.3.1.2, these proportions can also be found in the human body.

187

ing philosophy that it is an imitation of the deity to the extent that human faculties al¬
low. (W: 137, trans. Wright, in W: 147)

Although the topic is treated in the epistle on music, not only the work of a musi¬
cian, but the work of any kind of compositor - especially that of a calligrapher -
is seen as an imitation of the celestial harmony of proportions. 267

In the Jabirian Corpus , this topic is more explicitly linked with microcos-
mism and the field under examination is alchemy. In Kitdb al- 'awalim (f. 62a),
the author presents three worlds: the macrocosm, meaning the universe as a
whole; the microcosm (al- 'dlam as-saghir), referring to the human being; and the
“mesocosm” (al- 'dlam al-awsat), which is the Art (as-sind 'a) - referring to al¬
chemy. In Kitdb ar-rahma (149), the concept of the third, intermediate world is
derived from Plato, and Kraus (1943: 7) remarks that usually the parallelism be¬
tween three worlds in the Jabirian corpus is treated as a Platonic conception. 2< ’ s
Another dimension of the analogy is given in Kitdb ar-rahma (149), where
the nature of the Elixir is examined as the microcosm (see 4.3.3). In that context,
the noblest product the alchemist creates stands in an analogical relation to the
artist himself and to the world as a whole. Thus, not only the Art is considered to
correspond to the microcosm (and the macrocosm), but also the one practising it -
in the case of the Jabirian Corpus the alchemist - imitates the Creator. This is
stated explicitly in Kitdb al-mizdn as-saghir (449), where the author says that
there are two kinds of creations, one accomplished by the Creator and one accom¬
plished by the person practising the Art, which resembles the fust.

In his division of the microcosm-macrocosm analogy, Allers (1944: 325-326)
presents “aesthetic microcosmism” as a variation of the holistic analogy. By this
he refers, for instance, to the idea of “God as the great artist”. A similar interpreta¬
tion of microcosmism is recognized by Brague (1997: 533), who mentions al-
Kindl and al-Farabl as scholars who employ it in Islamic philosophy. According
to Brague, this form of the analogy also includes the definition of philosophy as
the imitation of God, which was also seen in the citation from the epistle on music
above. 269 Although Allers’s as well as Brague’s definitions of aesthetic variation

In this context, the Ikhwan (W: 181-182) point out that animals have their counterparts in the
heavenly spheres. The relationship between these two is like the relationship of a painted
picture to the thing it represents. As Wright (W: 171 n. 343) points out, this is a perfect
encapsulation of the Platonic mimesis theory (Republic X. 596-598).

The definition of these three worlds is not completely unambiguous. In Kitdb ustuqus al-uss
al-awwal (62) the author refers to the “mesocosm” (al-'dlam al-awsat) as the World of
Generation and Corruption. In that context, the microcosm is said to be the human body
while the human intellect is the macrocosm.

Imitation of God to the extent it is possible for a man often appears in the Ikhwan’s
definitions of philosophy (e.g., R II: 10 and III: 30), and sometimes also in the definition of
wisdom ( hikma ) (e.g., R III: 143).

188

is quite loose, it seems that the examples presented above represent it, and clearly
fall into the general category of holistic microcosmism, since they are about a
human being creating around him an order, which forms a replica of the order
appearing in himself.

5.4.2 Cosmological Definition of Music

As has been seen, the Ikhwan’s theory of music is related to the structural and
holistic microcosm-macrocosm analogies. Yet another interpretation of the analo¬
gy can be found in their musical theory when the overall definition of music is
examined. Islamic mediaeval definitions of music have been divided into two
branches. The first can be characterized as the cosmological theory of music initi¬
ated by al-Kindl. The second has more a practical perspective on music and its
most important representatives were al-Farabl and Ibn Sina. According to Leaman
(2004: 105), the major difference between these two branches is that for al-Kindi
and his followers “what is important about music is what it reflects”, while “for
al-Farabi and Ibn Sina what is important about music is what it does for us”. Al-
Farabl was himself a musician, which is probably the reason for his more practical
approach to music. Amnon Shiloah (1995: 49-51) characterizes the cosmological
branch of musical theory as an ethical, cosmological and therapeutic approach to
music and, according to him, in the Islamic context it reached its zenith in the
Rasa 'il.

Microcosmism in its broadest sense is present in the Pythagorean theory of
music in various ways. First, the definition of earthly music as a reflection of the
harmonies produced by the movements of the heavenly spheres is connected with
the cosmological idea that the lower is a sign of the higher. The correspondence
between the reality of the spheres and the material world under generation and
corruption is seen to rationally lead to the Pythagorean definition of music, which
is explained in the Rasa TV’s epistle on music in the following way:

The higher phenomena are primary causes to the phenomena that are in the world of

generation and corruption, and their movements are the cause of the movements of the

latter, and the movements of these imitate their movements, from which it necessarily

follows that the tones of these imitate their tones. (W: 80, trans. Wright, in W: 120-121)

A musician producing a replica of the order prevailing in the macrocosm is con¬
nected with the idea of a human being as an imitator of the Creator presented
above. As we saw in 4.3.1.2, the proportions of the human body correspond to the
heavenly spheres and, thus, music. Although regular musicians benefit from un¬
derstanding the mundane counterpart of the heavenly proportions, this is not nec¬
essary for the noblest of them, Pythagoras. In the Rasa 'il, Pythagoras is treated as
a prophet, and in the epistle on music (W: 82) the Ikhwan argue that - because of

189

the exceptional purity of his soul and wisdom of his heart - he was able to hear
the movements of the heavenly bodies and derive the principles of music directly
from the spherical music. He is mentioned as the first one to know the secrets of
this discipline and among his followers are mentioned Nicomachus, Ptolemy and
Euclid.

The third microcosmic aspect of music, as it is defined by the Ikhwan, is that
the influence of earthly music is seen as a microcosm of the influence of its heav¬
enly counterpart. According to the Rasa ’il, the influence of music on the individu¬
al soul corresponds to that of the celestial music to the souls of the heavenly
spheres and increases their cognisance of then noble origin:

Tones produced by the movements of the musician remind the individual souls that are
in the world of generation and corruption of the joy of the world of the celestial
spheres, just as the tones produced by the movements of the celestial spheres and the
heavenly bodies remind the souls that are there of the joy of the world of the spirits.

This is the conclusion derived from the premises associated with them by the sages,
that is, their assertion that the states of secondary, caused entities imitate those of the
primary entities that cause them. ( W: 79-80, trans. Wright, in W: 120)

During the centuries following the Ikhwan, the cosmological definition of music
as such influenced mostly in the margins of the Islamic theory of music, and
mainstream Islamic philosophers approached music from other perspectives: it
was understood principally as a phenomenon of this world, and the supernatural
did not have a place in definitions of music. The Pythagorean theory was, howev¬
er, preserved as part of the Sufi theory of music (Leaman 2004: 106).

Allers (1944: 371-377) presents the Pythagorean theory of music as an exam¬
ple of symbolistic microcosmism. As he notes, the difference between the struc¬
tural and symbolistic analogies is difficult to make. In this case, however, the de¬
fining feature of symbolistic microcosmism, the “code” needed for understanding
the system of correspondence, seems quite natural, since the secret of heavenly
music is revealed in its perceivable form only to prophets.

190

6. CONCLUSIONS

The questions I posed at the beginning of the work were twofold. Most important¬
ly, my aim was to study the meaning and use of the microcosm-macrocosm anal¬
ogy: I aimed to find out what microcosmism reveals concerning the idea of man
and to explore the ways the analogy is employed in the corpus. Secondarily, my
purpose was through these themes to examine the relationships of the texts to each
other in this respect and especially the position of the Rasa 'il among them. My
main findings will be presented in this chapter. Although all themes will occur in
each part of the chapter, I will start by examining the ways the analogy appears in
the texts, then turn to the notion of the human being and, lastly, take a look at the
chronological development of the idea in the corpus.

6.1 FORMS OF THE ANALOGY

The most important tool for analysing microcosmism turned out to be Allers’s
sixfold classification of the analogy. It works well in the Islamic context and my
threefold division correlates well with Allers’s categories. All forms of the analo¬
gy, as defined by Allers, can be found in the Islamic tradition. Elementaristic mi¬
crocosmism is present in all parts of the study and, in accordance with Allers’s
definition of this form of the analogy, it takes the role of the basic analogy appear¬
ing in all of the studied texts. It is often connected with human-specific micro¬
cosmism. The structural form of the idea - which also leaves quite a variety of
possibilities when drawing an analogy - is common too and takes the prominent
position especially in the physiological aspect of the analogy. Not only are explic¬
it physiological comparisons mostly based on the analogy at the structural level,
but also the scientific theories connected to microcosmism are dominated by that.
When it comes to more complex forms of microcosmism, such as holistic, sym¬
bolistic and - quite obviously - psychological analogies, these are found primarily
in the spiritual or normative forms of microcosmism. There are some occurrences
of the idea which do not fit into Allers’s categories, like the microcosm of human¬
ity, but these are scarce.

Regarding the division between metaphysical and metaphorical microcos¬
mism, my aim to leave out the metaphorical form of the analogy poses some chal¬
lenges. The same explicit comparisons stand as mere figures of speech for one
author while they may have a deeper metaphysical meaning for another. This is
the case, for instance, in the comparisons presenting the world as an anthropo¬
morphic entity: in the frame of the worldview of the Ikhwan, they cannot be seen

191

as pure metaphors, which is the case in many other texts. Also, any strict defini¬
tion of the meaning given to the analogy is in many cases difficult to make: apart
from the Rasa’il, in which microcosmism is obviously an essential part of the
worldview, in most of the other texts the analogy appears much more rarely and
cannot be examined as a crucial ideological element.

Explicit and implicit forms of the analogy are found in all three approaches to
the analogy. The term microcosm is rarely used, even the Ikhwan use it less than
twenty times in the whole Rasa'il. Nonetheless, some texts, like the Sirr, refer to
the term more often. Restricting examination of microcosmism only to the con¬
texts in which the term is used would obviously give different results from those
found in the present study. When it comes to the other form of the explicit micro-
cosmic idea, explicit comparisons, their occurrence in the corpus is much more
frequent. Explicit comparisons appear in all three parts of the study. Their use,
however, differs in some ways depending on the context. As descriptions of the
human body, comparisons are longer and often go into the crudest details. Spiritu¬
al comparisons, on the other hand, are seldom so straightforward and are often
used as narratives.

In this study the position of the microcosm was defined to concern only a/the
human being. A relevant question in this respect is, whether the role of the micro¬
cosm is self-evidently granted to man in the texts, or does this definition form a
problem? As for the Ikhwan, placing man in this role seems to be quite obvious.
There are some particular forms of the analogy which give other possible counter¬
parts for the macrocosm, like those related to the anthropomorphic universe and
comparisons between the city and the universe. Especially the latter do not, how¬
ever, seem to dislodge the human being from the position of a microcosm: they
can be seen to highlight the manifold correspondence occurring in the universe.

Thus, the analogical worldview does not solely concern the relationship be¬
tween man and the surrounding reality: in many texts, including the Rasa 'il, the
correspondence between levels of reality is much more complex and usually the
human being forms only one, albeit exceptional, level in these correspondences.
In the Jabirian texts, for instance, the manifold nature of the analogy is a prevail¬
ing feature: it not only defines the relationship between two entities (e.g., the hu¬
man being and the universe), but occurs at various - usually three - levels. It
seems that in many cases descriptions of other correspondences, even if they are
not explicitly linked with microcosmism, derive from the very same idea and also
imply the analogy at the level of the human being. Hence, the appearance of man
so often in these contexts shows that microcosmism is a doctrine concerning pri¬
marily the human being and the human being is at the centre of this web of corre¬
spondences. References to this manifold parallelism between various levels of
reality occur more often in physiological microcosmism, but are not alien to the

192

spiritual forms of the idea either: the idea is influential following the maxim of
“the lower is a sign of the higher” in the context of epistemology and can be seen,
for instance, in the hierarchy of scientific disciplines.

Examples presented in this study bring to the scene a variety of different mac¬
rocosms. Most comparisons in the cosmological context are, unsurprisingly, be¬
tween man and the universe as a whole. In the comparisons treating the human
being - his body or his soul - city-state comparisons are common. They are espe¬
cially relevant when human perfection is examined - usually from its spiritual but
also, as was seen in the Jabirian idea of the Elixir, from its physiological aspect.
Heavenly spheres work as the counterpart for man in various contexts, in cosmo¬
logical, spiritual and physiological comparisons, the last one being, however, the
most usual in this context. In addition to these typical macrocosms, some analo¬
gies propose a parallel position with man, for instance, the entire kingdom of ani¬
mals, human beings collectively or the order prevailing in a specific art.

6.2 THE IDEA OF MAN AND THE MICROCOSM

My study of microcosmism is divided into three chapters and this threefold divi¬
sion will also be used in these concluding remarks concerning the idea of man. As
will be seen, many themes are relevant not only in the chapter dedicated to the
topic but in other chapters as well.

6.2.1 The Cosmological Position of the Human Species

The topic which brings together all themes related to human-specific microcos¬
mism, is cosmology and the place of man in the cosmos. In the Rasa'il, one rea¬
son for the extensive use of the analogy is the cosmological system which fits well
with this kind of analogical conceptualization. The cosmological system of the
Ikhwan is kept rather simple and in then interpretation of Neoplatonic emanation-
ism the universe appears as a unified whole which is quite easily paralleled with
the human being. Especially elementaristic and structural forms of microcosmism
are a natural part of cosmology in many other texts as well. There are, however,
some central cosmological topics, such as the light metaphor, which are only
loosely related to microcosmism.

Some explicit comparisons are obviously used to express cosmological views.
This is the case when comparisons describe the universe as an anthropomorphic
being. These comparisons do not necessarily have any metaphysical meaning for
all the authors and the meaning given to them becomes evident only through more
extensive examination of the use of microcosmism. In these contexts, the authors
give little - if any - information about the concept of the human being and some

193

of them do not even restrict the microcosmic position to man. Nevertheless, these
comparisons provide a general cosmological frame for the topic of the universe or
world as a whole as the macrocosm, which occurs in several more detailed com¬
parisons treating the human being. Other examples of comparisons clarifying
cosmological views are those which concentrate on the unity of the soul: their
focus is sometimes on describing the function of the universe as a whole by means
of man instead of expressing views regarding man through the cosmos.

In some earlier traditions, the motivation for the use of the microcosm-
macrocosm analogy is related to cosmology. Man is like the macrocosm, because
the primordial man worked as the model in the creation of the universe. TusI has
mythological features in his references to the human archetype and some seem to
appear in the explicit physiological comparisons of the Ikhwan and al-QazwInl as
well. Only SuhrawardI, however, explicitly revives mythological elements in his
texts. In his case as well, however, they are not much more than stylistic features.
None of our Islamic thinkers explains the use of the analogy in the same way as is
done in earlier mythologies. Even if microcosmism came to them partly from the
Eastern mythological tradition, the motivation for the analogy is necessarily dif¬
ferent in the Islamic context: Islamic thinkers did not adopt the explanation for the
analogy from earlier mythology. This, obviously, was because they had their own
mythology.

Like any other philosophical notion, the microcosmic idea is assimilated to
the Islamic worldview. As an example of this we could take the contexts in which
the Ikhwan express then religious views through microcosmism. This is nothing
exceptional: the Ikhwan frequently verify their philosophical views with holy rev¬
elation. The recurring Qur anic verse is “your creation and your upraising are but
as a single soul” (Q. 31:28). 27(1 In the Rasd ’il, the verse is attached to the micro¬
cosm-macrocosm analogy, on the one hand, as a confirmation for the existence of
the Universal Soul and, on the other hand, as an approval of the idea of the human
archetype. The influence of religion can also be seen in letter-symbolism empha¬
sizing the importance of the Arabic language as well as in some comparisons
which are taken to the level of the godly presence - a phenomenon occurring,
however, only occasionally in the work.

That the human being - from among all beings - is put in the microcosmic
position emphasizes his central role in the created world and in the cosmos as a
whole. This is not exceptional for thinkers representing a monotheistic worldview.
In some cases, the views of the Ikhwan appear in this respect somewhat original
and even contradictory. This can be seen when animal features are described as
being summarized in the human being. The Ikhwan define this as something posi-

270

On the translation of this verse, see note 94.

194

tive and it implies a positive attitude - or even a humanist approach alien to the
Middle Ages - towards other animals. Man is defined as one of the beings in the
sublunar world and despite his position as the vicegerent of God on earth, the
Ikhwan demand from man some humility towards other species - a theme that
arises from time to time in the 22nd epistle. Like most other authors, the Ikhwan,
however, also take it as a bestial feature in man that he epitomizes animal charac¬
teristics. In this they follow the negative attitude towards the cosmologically low¬
er beings - a common view for their times.

A predominant feature in human-specific microcosmism is the middle posi¬
tion of the human being among the created. This is prevalent not only in the con¬
texts in which it is explicitly mentioned but in most cases of human-specific mi¬
crocosmism. Man is considered the middle being in the universe on account of
many of his corporeal and spiritual aspects, and this also influences the epistemo¬
logical views of the authors. A basic idea is the psychophysical whole that man
forms, which is connected more generally with the question of the body-soul rela¬
tionship. This aspect of the middle position of man is contrary to one form of the
human-specific microcosm-macrocosm analogy: the human archetype as the mi¬
crocosm.

In their microcosmism, the Ikhwan concentrate on man’s corporeal aspect or
on man as a psychophysical whole more than on the human soul. However, the
human archetype is a purely spiritual being and, for this reason, his microcosmic
position should be understood in a different manner from the other interpretations
of the analogy. This might also explain why the microcosmic role of the human
archetype is only treated in separate contexts in the Rasa 'il and does not appear in
the microcosmic epistles at all.

This is not, however, the only discrepancy in the Ikhwan’s concept of the hu¬
man archetype: another has to do with the relationship between the species.
SuhrawardT’s view of this matter is evidently Platonic, whereas the Ikhwan take
an ambiguous position in this discussion. On the one hand, the human being is a
link in the continuous chain of being, in which their views come close to evolu¬
tionism. On the other hand, the complete opposite to this, Platonic idealism with
its strict borders between the species may be read from the Rasa 'il as well.

Yet another noteworthy topic arises especially in the discussion on the human
archetype as the microcosm and it is essential for the whole topic of the third
chapter of this study. When the human archetype is described as the microcosm so
many different aspects of the idea are mentioned that these contexts seem to de¬
fine microcosmism of the Ikhwan more generally. This question is not only dis¬
cussed in the third chapter dedicated to the topic but also in the fifth chapter.
There are some contexts which obviously treat humanity as a whole - namely the
human archetype - as the microcosm, but usually such a distinction is not easy to

195

make. None of the studied texts explicitly restricts the microcosmic position to the
human being as a representative of his species or claims that it would only be an
individual man who may become a microcosm through perfection. Contrary to
Izutsu’s view, this is not, in my opinion, the case even in Ibn ' Arabl’s TadbTrdt. In
it, man is seen as an all-encompassing being at the cosmological level, but the
same analogy is used to describe the perfection of a human individual. These dif¬
ferent levels do not contradict each other, because they are defined in different
ways.

The position of the Ikhwan in this cannot, in the light of the evidence, be
completely recognized. If microcosmism in the Rasa 'il was examined solely in
the two epistles dedicated to the analogy, there would be no reason to assume that
the Ikhwan define microcosmism as a specific feature of the human being. It is
only elsewhere - in the passages treating the human archetype and in some epis¬
temological contexts - that the Ikhwan express the all-encompassing position not
as a feature of an individual man, but as that of the universal human form. The
question is that, if the human archetype is behind all microcosmism, why would
such a topic be left out from the epistles treating the idea? One explanation for
this may be that it is considered a self-evident fact which is not worth mentioning.
In the 26th epistle, however, there are passages which seem to contradict this idea.
I find it hard to believe that, for example, the intention of the story of the wise
king, obviously an essential chapter of the epistle, would not be connected with
human perfection and intended as a description of the path to perfection for an
individual man, even if not directly connected with the mystical variations of the
same topic. More than defining microcosmism in general, the way to attach the
human archetype to various forms of the analogy can be seen as a particular level
of microcosmism and an indication of the way the analogy prevails at various lay¬
ers of the idea of man in the Rasa 'il.

6.2.2 The Question of Corporeality

An essential question was what microcosmism reveals about corporeality. The
physiological aspect of the idea appears to some extent in most of the studied
texts. In the earliest texts more closely attached to the Hermetic tradition, consid¬
eration of the human body as a microcosm is a very basic part of the whole idea of
man. In the Sirr, the microcosm-macrocosm analogy appears in various forms,
including its spiritual and human-specific forms, but the analogy is, however,
primarily physiological. Components of microcosmism in the Sirr are astrology
and, partly related to this, the features it shares with Greek Hermetic microcos¬
mism. Explicit physiological comparisons - regarded by Marquet as characteristi¬
cally Hermetic - are, however, scarce.

196

The corporeal aspect receives much attention in the Ikhwan’s idea of man
even in some areas which are not so evident. The Ikhwan demonstrate their re¬
spect for the bodily aspect of man, for instance, in their epistemological views, in
which man’s twofold nature as a psychophysical whole is accentuated and sensory
knowledge is given an essential position. A similar feature is perceivable in their
handling of self-knowledge: in many contexts one can see that the self to be
known consists of both spiritual and material aspects, and knowledge concerning
the material world is central also in achieving the higher type of gnosis. In com¬
parison to the Ikhwan, al-Ghazall seems to be more ambiguous about this. Alt¬
hough he clearly leaves the bodily aspect of the human being outside the concept
of selfhood, he refers to contemplation of one’s own body as a means to achieve
divine knowledge.

In the Rasa ’il, a unique element in Islamic thought appears, which emphasizes
the Ikhwan’s interest in the structure of the human body: their aesthetic treatment
of human measurements. It not only works as a clear indication of their special
admiration of harmonic proportions, but also attaches the corporeal aspect of man
to the cosmological and astronomical dimensions of microcosmism.

Most evidently the interest of the Ikhwan in the bodily aspect of man can be
seen in their extensive use of explicit physiological comparisons. In these, the
human body is not only admired but also views concerning its composition are
expressed through the analogy. As for the Ikhwan, the human body is an organism
constituted of different parts and organs whose functions are seen to be similar to
and even dependent on other layers of reality: an essential aspect of the corporeal
microcosmism is its close attachment to astrological views. In physiological com¬
parisons, mythological and Hermetic influences are obvious and may have had an
impact on the overall concept of corporeality as well.

A prevailing feature especially in the physiological comparisons of the
Ikhwan is their constant use of certain numbers. The value given to numbers ex¬
plains their position and recurrence in the analogies: the same numbers reappear
in the comparisons between man and the surrounding universe, emphasizing the
nobility of certain numbers and giving a “mathematical” dimension to microcos¬
mism. This aspect also works as a way of highlighting the appearance of the ana¬
logical worldview at various levels of reality. Even if it would sometimes be easy
to find different numbers of, for example, materials of the human body, the
Ikhwan tend to restrict their number to nine, which corresponds to various layers
of reality.

Comparisons concentrating on the human body are often attached to cosmo¬
logical and scientific ideas. Although - apart from some particular terminological
references appearing in comparisons - scientific theories are rarely explicitly
linked with microcosmism, sometimes the wider meaning of explicit comparisons

197

become evident only in the frame of the scientific worldview. In many examples
of the scientific role of the analogy, especially when it comes to astrology, micro-
cosmic man is described not only as corresponding to, but also depending on the
macrocosm. This sometimes brings a practical dimension to the speculative nature
of the analogy. This is clearly seen in music therapy, which is a good example of
the role of microcosmism in the very widely spread and long-lived theories. On
the other hand, explicit comparisons may also work as an inspiration for develop¬
ing some more marginal scientific ideas.

Although for many authors physiological microcosmism forms part of the
very core of then' worldview, a search for metaphysical claims behind the analogy
is not always reasonable. Even in texts which clearly affirm the metaphysical
meaning of the analogy, explicit comparisons - mostly in their physiological, but
also in their spiritual form - are often used for stylistic purposes only with no in¬
tention of expressing any more profound philosophical views through them.

6.2.3 A Microcosm - Perfect Man or Anyone?

If physiological microcosmism is more often attached to wider scientific and
cosmological views, in the spiritual aspect of the analogy, the focus is more clear¬
ly on the idea of man and the order appearing in him. Comparisons concentrating
on the spiritual aspect of man can be seen to express the ways the human soul and
the selfhood of man are defined: which part of man is seen as the dominant one
and how do these different aspects of the human soul work and co-operate?

These comparisons indicate the hierarchy appearing in the human soul. The
faculty placed on the royal throne indicates a great deal about the author’s idea of
man. In this, we can see some differences between comparisons with epistemolog¬
ical and mystical or ethical intentions: while the highest post-sensational faculty
often mles in the former, the soul or spirit keeping its headquarters in the physical
heart plays the same role in the latter. Nevertheless, many texts, including the
Rasa ‘il, take various different positions depending on the context and purpose of a
particular comparison.

Even more than in physiological comparisons, the psychophysical holistic na¬
ture of man is emphasized in the comparisons concentrating on the spiritual aspect
of man. Although the purpose of the comparisons is obviously to describe the
spiritual aspect of man, the corporeal is often included in the comparisons as well,
at least in expressions of the physiological locations of the human faculties. In this
way even Sufi authors, whose primary interest is in the spiritual development of
man, involve the human body in their rhetoric. Especially in the views of Ibn
‘ArabI the way to consider the human body as a tool for the inner faculties is em¬
phasized.

198

Al-Ghazall and later Sufis lay special emphasis on the thu d level of the corre¬
spondence, namely God. For them, microcosmic man not only corresponds to the
created world, but also to the divine attributes. In this way, microcosmism enables
a connection with the divine. This also makes self-contemplation part of the spir¬
itual path and the practice of mysticism. Thus, in the process of human perfection,
the analogy takes on an educational role, which is clearly seen in the ethical spir¬
itual comparisons of al-Ghazall. In these, the most essential feature of the spir itual
comparisons occurs in an evident form: they are expressions of the achievement
of the ideal state of man.

It can be seen that Brague’s claim concerning the lack of the ideal or norma¬
tive aspect in Islamic microcosmism is incorrect. Views connected with the imita¬
tion of the macrocosm can be found not only in Sufi writings, in which they are
evidently the prevailing theme in the whole microcosmism, but in most texts of
the corpus including the Rasa'il, the ' Ajd’ib and Jabirian works, and in many of
them they also appear to be connected with the term microcosm, which is explicit¬
ly denied by Brague.

Although some comparisons express the tragic state of most of the human
kingdoms titled by devil forces, in all themes treated in the fifth chapter of this
study, microcosmism is also used in order to describe the ideal order appearing in
the perfect man. This can be seen in explicit spiritual comparisons and in descrip¬
tions of the human mind as a reflection of al-Lawh al-Mahfuz. In them, the analo¬
gy is often employed in explaining the ideal order according to which the human
faculties or parts of the human soul should work. The branch of microcosmism
which Allers refers to as psychological - related to Islamic epistemological views
in both of its main branches but especially in its Platonic interpretations - was
seen to be closely connected with imitation as well. Also the example of aesthetic
holistic microcosmism presents the microcosmic position of man as an ideal.

Even if human-specific microcosmism concentrates on the actual state of the
human being as the microcosm, the potential aspect of the analogy is in some cas¬
es present in that context as well. This is the case when the human being is exam¬
ined as a microcosm to epitomize animal species. Also when it comes to the mid¬
dle position of man between devil and angel, which is usually described as an ac¬
tual, innate feature of the human species, some normative, idealistic connotations
can be found. In these contexts, potentiality also occurs, not in the form of urging
one to become a microcosm, but as advising one to get rid of this suspect state
giving up the lower part of the self together with its bestiality. Nevertheless, some,
like Ibn ' ArabI, see the middle position of man as his ideal state. This is also em¬
phasized in his physiognomic views, which highlight the moderate aspect of hu¬
man characteristics as an ideal middle-way.

199

Physiognomy also works as an example of scientific theories using the idea of
the human body as a microcosm in the context of human perfection and is, in this
way, also connected with the ideal man at the spiritual level. Ibn ‘Arabl’s treat¬
ment of physiognomy shows that the physiological microcosmism - even if it
seems in its contexts and purposes to differ greatly from the spiritual normative
analogy - may actually be closely related to it.

Another example of the perfection at the physiological level is Jabirian al¬
chemical theory. The texts attributed to Jabir ibn Hayyan clearly concentrate on
the physiological aspect of man and in them it is a prevailing idea even in the con¬
cept of perfection. The harmony of opposing forces is seen as an ideal for all lev¬
els of reality from minerals to human beings: it appears in the perfect man as well
as in the perfect metal. A key to this, the Elixir, corresponds to the order appear¬
ing in microcosmic man. Talking about the ideal state, we talk about a physical
state - or at least of a state explained in terms of physiological factors. In this
way, the physiological microcosmic idea forms part of the Jabirian theory of per¬
fection of any being, including that of an individual man.

In the Rasd’il, human perfection is closely related to knowledge, and
knowledge, on the other hand, is in the key position of then whole microcosmism.
In their epistemological views, the Ikhwan treat knowledge as a means of salva¬
tion. According to them, one needs to know oneself in order to gain any kind of
knowledge, because self-knowledge is the first step in all sciences. Even if the
Ikhwan refer to the Delphic Maxim, it seems that for them the knowledge that
man can deduce from self-knowledge primarily concerns this world. As a micro¬
cosm, man can, by contemplating himself, acquire knowledge concerning the
world around him and understand its structure and functions, which on account of
their abundance would otherwise be unreachable for an individual man. The mi¬
crocosmic position as a means to achieve knowledge is implicitly also present in
their theory of knowledge: the human soul is a potential microcosm which
through acquisition of knowledge turns into an actualized microcosm.

A central question posed in this study was the motivation for the idea: why is
the microcosm-macrocosm analogy developed and taken into the centre of philos¬
ophy by the Ikhwan? Like many others, the Ikhwan for the most part leave the
question open in their texts and the doctrine is not given a straightforward expla¬
nation in the Rasd’il. It seems, however, that the main motivation for the parallel¬
ism is related to epistemology. Considering, firstly, various contexts in which mi¬
crocosmic man is treated in connection with knowledge and, secondly, the close
ties of the topic with self-knowledge in the work, the closest we can get in ex¬
plaining the motivation for using the analogy by the Ikhwan is epistemological
purposes. Often the aim of expressing microcosmic views - even those related to

200

the physiological aspect of man - is making the world knowable for a human be¬
ing, which is phrased explicitly thus in the 26 th epistle.

6.3 THE RASA IL AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF ISLAMIC MICRO-
COSMISM

Defining the overall place of microcosmism in mediaeval Islamic thought was not
one of the purposes of this study, but in the light of the presented examples it can
be seen that some of its forms was far from being marginal. The appearance of the
physiological microcosmic idea - for instance in the form of astrological embry¬
ology - in some mainstream scientific works, shows that the analogy as such was
not regarded merely as pseudo-science. It was considered, at least, as something
worth mentioning and opposing. This can also be seen in the case of the theory of
knowledge. Even if Islamic thinkers rarely explicitly connect the microcosmic
idea to their epistemological systems, it is part of the theory of knowledge in both
of its main branches. As regards the explicit form of the analogy, only the meta¬
phorical variations of it, such as the description of the universe as an anthropo¬
morphic being, can be regarded as widely spread ideas in Islamic thought.

In its metaphysical physiological form microcosmism has often been consid¬
ered something particularly Hermetic in Islamic mediaeval thought. In the present
corpus as well, this aspect of the analogy has received more attention in the texts
more closely related to Hermeticism. Spiritual comparisons which concentrate on
epistemology and ethics - themes that were predominantly treated by the Sufi
authors of the corpus - have, on the other hand, often been connected with the
Greek philosophical origins of the analogy. It would be tempting to say that the
Ikhwan, extensively interested in both aspects of the idea, form a synthesis of
these traditions. Such a division, however, even if it to some extent applies to the
corpus, oversimplifies the issue: explicit physiological comparisons also occur in
the texts of the Sufi authors and the spiritual aspect is not left out even in the most
obviously Hermetic works of the corpus.

Nevertheless, it can be said that the earliest texts of the corpus, the Sirr, Jdbi-
rian Corpus and the Rasa 'il, share in their microcosmism a special interest in the
bodily aspect of man. Taking into account the close ties of these texts between
each other, one might expect some exchange of influence between the texts in this
respect. Nonetheless, their approach to physiological microcosmism differs great¬
ly from each other. As strongly alchemical works, the Sirr and the Jabirian texts
are, for instance, far more interested in the four elements than the authors of the
Rasa 'il. In other areas of the analogy, similarities appear in such common themes
- such as the middle position of man or man epitomizing animal species - that
they do not give reason to assume any more specific relations between the texts.

201

Especially in the case of the Jabirian texts, this is somewhat surprising and the
topic requires more extensive study. In general, microcosmism is more developed
and manifold in the Rasa 'il than in the texts preceding it. Even if the Ikhwan do
not develop the variety of the analogy themselves, they bring together a wide
range of earlier elaborations and amalgamate them into then worldview in an ex¬
ceptional way.

Proving the transmission of ideas is always difficult, but the importance of the
Ikhwan for the later development of microcosmism in its physical form - espe¬
cially when it comes to explicit physiological comparisons - is evident. A few
short explicit comparisons can already be found in the Sirr. Longer listings occur
in the Rasa 'il and because of their quite rare use in the Islamic tradition and the
formerly proved influence of the Ikhwan on the texts in some other areas, there is
reason to assume that the Ikhwan transmitted - directly or indirectly - if not the
whole idea, then at least some particular comparisons to some later texts.

An obvious example of this is Ghdyat al-hakun. There, references to explicit
comparisons - mostly to physiological, but also to spiritual comparisons - are
presented in similar forms to those of the Rasa 'il and the chapter treating the topic
makes only a few additions to microcosmic views which cannot be found in the
thought of the Ikhwan. Another text obviously related to the physiological com¬
parisons in the Rasa 'il is the 'Ajd ’ib. There one can find a long and detailed com¬
parison between man and the city, which is very similar to a comparison of the
Ikhwan. The appearance of physiological comparisons in Ibn ‘Arabl’s writings
might also be connected to the Rasd'il, but he is more likely influenced by the
general idea rather than individual comparisons.

Despite their emphasis on the earthly, the Ikhwan start to form a basis for the
mystical interpretations of the microcosmic idea. There are some interesting the¬
matic resemblances, although no straightforward influences can be shown be¬
tween the Ikhwan and Sufi interpretations of the topic. Ibn ArabT’s views have
various similarities with those of the Ikhwan: in addition to the uniqueness of
number four and some explicit physiological comparisons, the two share the astro¬
logical aspect of the spiritual comparisons. In al-Ghazall’s works, on the other
hand, the analogy develops many dimensions which are not present in the Rasa 'il.
In his explicit comparisons, the analogy is primarily used to express ethical ideals.
The examples from SuhrawardT are few and no remarkable similarity to the
Ikhwan can be perceived in them. More extensive examination of the production
of all these three authors would, however, be required in order to gain a compre¬
hensive understanding of their microcosmisms. When it comes to al-Ghazall and
SuhrawardT in general, then elaborations of the topic in comparison to those the
Ikhwan are more useful in defining the specific features of the use of the analogy
than in tracing influences between the texts.

202

In the more implicit forms of microcosmism, the role of the Ikhwan as trans¬
mitters is even more difficult to affirm. As regards the scientific disciplines relat¬
ed to the analogy, it can be seen that the embryological views - and the micro¬
cosmism - of TusT’s Rawda were possibly influenced by the Rasd’il. In general,
the treatment of astrological embryology does not necessarily indicate that the
author would have considered it to have anything to do with microcosmism, but
the way these two are presented in both the Rasa 'il and the Rawda suggest that
the authors consider the theories to be connected.

The microcosm-macrocosm analogy still had an essential role in the thirteenth
century popular scientific idea of man as can be seen from the writings of al-
Qazwini. Al-Qazwlnl uses the analogy in various forms in a fashion similar to the
Ikhwan’s and it is a central element in the chapter treating the human being, tak¬
ing human-specific, physiological and normative forms. Despite the author’s in¬
terest in the topic, it seems that it does not have the same metaphysical meaning as
in the Rasa il. Explicit comparisons appearing in the text lack some metaphysical
dimensions essential for the Ikhwan and astrological embryology is mentioned,
but not discussed in detail. This indicates that in the popular encyclopaedic tradi¬
tion represented by al-QazwInl, the microcosmic idea is used explicitly, albeit
primarily as a curious metaphor. It is an attraction for the imagination of the read¬
er and enlivens the text. For the authors of the Rasa 'il, on the other hand, it is evi¬
dently a strong metaphysical argument to be understood literally - perhaps not in
each and every individual occurrence and detail, but as a whole.

203

204

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